ABRAHAM  LINCOLN. 


VISIT  TO  CALIFORNIA. 


-BY- 


JOSHUA  F.  SPEED. 


\V. 


/ 


Reminiscences  of  Abraham  Lincol 


N 


Notes  of  a  Visit  to  California. 


Tmio  i^jejctttvjes. 


BY 

JOSHUA    F.    SPEED 


With  a  Sketch  of  His  Life. 


LOUISVILLE,  KY. 

PRINTED    BY    JOHN   P.    MORTON    AND    COMPANY. 

1884 


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JOSHUA  FRY  SPEED. 


Joshua  Fry  Speed  was  born  November  14,  18 14.  His 
parents  were  John  Speed  and  Lucy  G.  Speed.  They 
came  from  Virginia  to  Kentucky  in  1783,  in  their  early 
youth.  The  father  of  John  Speed  was  Captain  James 
Speed,  who  was  born  in  Mecklinburg,  Va.,  and  obtained 
his  title  by  service  in  the  Revolutionary  War.  The 
father  of  Lucy  G.  Speed  was  Joshua  Fry.  Captain 
James  Speed  and  Joshua  Fry  are  both  noted  in  the 
early  history  of  Kentucky.  The  former,  as  a  member 
of  the  Conventions  by  which  the  State  was  separated 
from  Virginia  and  became  a  separate  commonwealth ;  the 
latter  for  his  connection  with  educational  interests.  The 
ancestors  of  each  came  from  England,  and  settled  in 
Virginia  prior  to  the  beginning  of  the  last  century. 

John  Speed  and  Lucy  G.  Fry  were  married  in  1809. 
They  lived  at  the  old  homestead,  known  as  Farming- 
ton,  on  the  Louisville  and  Bardstown  Turnpike  road, 
about  five  miles  from  Louisville.  There  Joshua  F. 
Speed  was  born,  the  fifth  in  a  family  of  ten  children,  all 
of  whom  except  one  survived  him.  He  was  well  edu- 
cated at  the  schools  in  Jefferson  County,  and  under  the 
tuition  of  Joshua  Fry,  and  at  St.  Joseph's  College,  at 
Bardstown. 


4  yoshiia  Fry  Speed. 

It  is  related  that  when  at  school  as  a  child  he 
replied  to  questions  in  the  same  frank,  pointed,  and  com- 
prehensive manner  that  characterized  him  as  a  man.  He 
was  always  positive  and  direct,  and  often  his  plainness 
of  speech  amounted  to  bluntness. 

While  at  college  he  fell  sick,  and  was  cared  for  at  the 
house  of  his  uncle,  who  lived  near  Bardstown.  When 
he  recovered  he  rode  home  to  his  father  on  horseback, 
that  being  the  mode  of  traveling  in  that  day. 

His  father  was  anxious  for  him  to  return  to  college, 
but  he  steadfastly  refused,  declaring  he  was  old  enough  to 
begin  to  make  his  own  way  in  the  world.  He  then  spent 
between  two  and  three  years  as  a  clerk  in  the  wholesale 
store  of  Wm.  H.  Pope,  then  the  largest  establishment  in 
Louisville. 

After  this  he  spent  seven  years  of  his  life  as  a  mer- 
chant in  Springfield,  111.  He  makes  reference  to  this  in 
his  lecture  upon  Abraham  Lincoln.  At  Springfield  he 
became  an  intimate  friend  not  only  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  but 
also  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas,  Col.  John  Hardin,  Col.  Ba- 
ker, Gen.  Shields,  Judge  Gillespie,  Nathaniel  Pope,  and 
others. 

It  is  noticeable  that  his  association  was  with  men  of 
that  class.  From  his  boyhood  he  regarded  life  with  a 
serious  business-like  gravity,  which  led  him  to  seek  the 
companionship  of  young  men  of  like  disposition,  or  of 
persons  older  than  himself. 

His  life  at  Springfield  furnished  many  incidents  amus- 
ing and  interesting,  which    he  was   fond    of    relating. 


yoshua  Fry  Speed.  5 

Often  in  after  years,  in  a  circle  of  friends,  his  memory 
would  recur  to  that  period,  and  he  would  tell  his  expe- 
riences as  a  country  merchant  in  his  crisp  narrative  style, 
half  playful,  half  serious,  so  as  to  charm  all  who  heard 
him. 

Among  his  friends  at  Springfield  he  showed  the  same 
characteristics  that  became  more  conspicuous  in  later 
years.  He  took  a  lively  interest  in  public  affairs,  and 
assisted  in  editing  a  newspaper,  but  his  personal  friends 
and  associates  were  in  all  parties.  His  friendships  were 
never  affected  by  political  or  religious  views  differing 
from  his  own. 

He  returned  from  Springfield  to  Kentucky  in  the 
year  1842,  and  engaged  in  farming  for  about  nine  years. 
He  was  married  February  15,  1842,  to  Miss  Fanny  Hen- 
ning,  a  sister  of  James  W.  Henning,  of  Louisville. 
They  made  their  home  on  a  farm,  in  the  Pond  Settle- 
ment neighborhood,  about  thirteen  miles  from  Louisville, 
on  the  Salt  River  road. 

It  was  a  very  pretty  place,  lying  at  the  foot  of  the 
knobs.  The  dwelling  was  a  log  house.  They  both 
often  recurred  to  their  farm-life  as  the  happiest  part  of 
their  lives.  She  was  particularly  fond  of  flowers,  and 
in  this  respect  he  was  a  genial  companion.  The  grounds 
about  the  house  were  covered  with  roses,  the  beauty  of 
which  was  the  subject  of  remark  by  all  their  neighbors 
and  visitors  from  the  city.  In  addition  to  the  enjoyment 
of  these,  they  spent  many  hours  together  in  the  fields 
and  woods,  seeking  rare  species  of  wild  flowers.     He 


6  jfoshua  Fry  Speed. 

had  a  vein  of  sentiment  in  his  nature  which  made  him 
fond  of  flowers  and  poetry,  which  his  active  business 
never  eradicated.  Evidences  of  this  are  found  in  his 
letters  and  lectures,  and  his  friends  recall  how  often  it 
was  manifested  in  his  conversation. 

In  the  year  1848,  while  he  lived  on  the  farm,  he  was 
elected  to  represent  Jefferson  County  in  the  State  Legis- 
lature, Though  often  solicited,  he  would  never  again 
consent  to  become  a  candidate  for  or  hold  any  office. 

He  moved  into  the  city  of  Louisville  in  185 1,  and 
formed  a  partnership  with  his  brother-in-law,  James  W. 
Henning,  in  the  real  -  estate  business.  This  relation 
continued  until  his  death.  Until  the  year  1861  his  life 
was  uneventful,  he  pursued  his  vocation  with  great  suc- 
cess, devoting  to  it  his  entire  time  and  energy.  The 
firm  of  Henning  and  Speed  became  one  of  the  best 
known  in  Louisville.  It  transacted  a  very  large  and  im- 
portant business.  The  two  partners  were  admirably 
suited  to  each  other.  Mr.  Henning  possessed  an  un- 
equaled  knowledge  of  the  real  estate  in  the  city  and 
county.  Mr.  Speed  had  no  superior  as  a  financier. 
Their  business  embraced  agencies  for  many  of  the  largest 
owners  of  city  property,  and  they  were  trustees  of  many 
large  estates.  The  public  records  show  the  large  interests 
intrusted  to  their  care  by  wills,  deeds  of  trusts,  and  ap- 
pointment by  the  courts.  In  the  division  of  estates  and 
valuation  of  property  they  were  constantly  appealed  to. 
In  all  such  matters  their  judgment  was  so  much  relied 
on  that  the  courts,  of  their  own  motion,  not  infrequently 


yoshua  Fry  Speed.  7 

directed  litigants  to  obtain  the  testimony  of  one  or  the 
other  before  deciding  a  controversy. 

Among  their  agencies  were  estates  of  real  and  per- 
sonal property  belonging  to  persons  who  resided  in  the 
South  during  the  war.  In  the  midst  of  that  destructive 
conflict,  these  persons  apprehended  their  possessions  were 
swept  away;  but  when  the  war  ended  they  found  every 
thing  preserved  with  the  steadily  accumulated  earning  of 
four  years.  Their  gratitude  naturally  found  expression 
in  beautiful  tokens  of  remembrance. 

Joshua  Speed  also  managed  the  estates  of  his  widowed 
mother  and  his  unmarried  and  widowed  sisters. 

The  uniform  positive  and  emphatic  testimony  of  all 
is  in  praise  of  his  ability,  fidelity,  and  fairness.  He  gave 
his  personal  attention  to  all  business  intrusted  to  him. 
No  one  knew  better  how  to  invest  money,  or  how  to 
buy  and  sell  property.  His  skill  and  sound  judgment 
not  only  built  up  for  himself  a  handsome  fortune,  it  was  all 
put  forth  to  the  best  advantage  for  the  benefit  of  all  whose 
interests  were  in  his  hands. 

In  l86i  his  whole  heart  was  in  the  Union  cause,  and 
the  intimate  acquaintance  he  had  with  Mr.  Lincoln 
enabled  him  to  exert  all  his  ability  directly  for  that 
cause. 

One  of  the  fruits  of  their  intimacy  was  a  visit  of  Mr. 
Lincoln  to  Kentucky  some  years  prior  to  the  war.  He 
saw,  at  the  old  Farmington  homestead,  slavery  in  the 
form  often  spoken  of  as  patriarchal — the  mildest,  best 
phase  of  it.     But  on  his  return,  he  witnessed  on  the 


8  Joshua  Fry  Speed. 

steamer  the  scene  described  in  his  letter,  quoted  in  Mr. 
Speed's  lecture.  There  was  the  bitterness  of  the  insti- 
tution. He  thus  spoke  from  actual  knowledge  the 
words,  "  If  slavery  is  not  wrong,  nothing  is  wrong." 

Another  of  the  fruits  of  this  intimacy  was,  that  in 
that  critical  period,  when  so  much  depended  on  the 
position  Kentucky  would  take,  the  President  could 
rely  upon  one  whose  knowledge  of  the  State,  ability, 
judgment,  and  earnest  fidelity  were  all  of  the  highest 
order. 

This  was,  perhaps,  the  most  active  part  of  Mr.  Speed's 
life.  He  made  many  trips  to  Washington.  He  was  in- 
trusted with  the  most  important  and  delicate  missions. 
His  every-day  intercourse  was  with  the  President  and 
members  pf  the  Cabinet,  and  the  highest  officers  of  the 
army.  In  this  connection  two  things  are  most  striking: 
First,  his  entire  self  abnegation  both  as  to  emoluments 
and  honors.  He  gave  freely  his  time,  energies,  and 
means  to  the  cause  he  had  at  heart,  and  all  without  at- 
tracting the  slightest  attention  to  himself.  None  but 
those  with  whom  his  business  was,  knew  of  that  in  which 
he  was  engaged.  Second,  he  offended  no  one,  and  in- 
curred no  ill-will.  He  was  full  of  generosity  and  liber- 
ality to  individuals  whose  sentiments  differed  from  his 
own,  while  he  opposed  the  cause  they  espoused.  An 
incident  will  illustrate  this  :  While  the  war  was  raging 
he  was  summoned  as  grand  juror  in  the  Federal  Court. 
The  grand  jurors  were  required  to  make  oath  that  they 
had  not  given  aid  or  comfort  to  the  enemy  of  the  coun- 


Joshua  Fry  Speed.  9 

try.  To  the  surprise  of  every  one  he  said  he  did  not 
know  that  he  could  take  that  oath.  The  judge  inquired 
the  reason.  "Because,"  said  he,  "  I  have  furnished  pris- 
oners with  money,  when  I  knew  they  were  going  to  en- 
gage in  the  rebellion."  The  court  promptly  stated  that 
this  was  no  disqualification. 

The  following  extract  from  a  letter  from  Gen.  John 
W.  Finnell,  who  was  Adj't  General  of  Kentucky  during 
the  war,  sets  forth  Mr.  Speed's  services  to  his  country 
at  that  time : 

In  the  earlier  days  of  the  rebellion,  Joshua  F.  Speed  played  a 
very  important,  but  before  the  general  public  an  inconspicuous  part 
in  saving  Kentucky  to  the  cause  of  the  Union.  He  was  a  quiet,  ob- 
servant, courageous  man.  Full  of  energy  and  resource,  self  reliant, 
ardently  attached  to  the  Union,  and  fixed  in  the  noble  purpose  to  do 
his  whole  duty,  letting  consequences  take  care  of  themselves. 

He  was  the  intimate  and  trusted  friend  of  the  great  Lincoln,  the 
companion  and  associate  of  his  younger  days,  and  was  rightly  esti- 
mated by  the  martyred  President  for  his  matchless  integrity  and  un- 
faltering love  of  country. 

To  him  Gen.  Nelson  was  sent  with  the  arms  furnished  by  the  Fed- 
eral Government  for  distribution  among  the  Union  men  of  Kentucky, 
and  under  his  direction  the  arms  were  distributed  and  placed  in  loyal 
hands.  He  it  was  who  called  the  first  meeting  of  prominent  Unionists, 
held  at  Frankfort  early  in  May,  1861,  to  devise  means  to  save  the 
State  from  the  designs  of  the  agents  and  friends  of  the  Confederacy. 
He  held  numerous  conferences  all  through  that  summer,  at  different 
parts  in  the  State,  with  prominent  friends  of  the  Union,  and  seemed  at 
all  times  instinctively  to  grasp  the  situation  and  to  fully  comprehend 
the  peril;  to  see  so  clearly  the  needs  of  the  hour,  that  though  his 
views  were  presented  modestly,  and  in  such  a  sometimes  provokingly 
quiet  way,  yet  they  were  almost  uniformly  adopted  as  the  wisest  and 
the  best. 

There  never  was  at  any  time  a  question  of  the  attachment  of  an 
overwhelming  majority  of  the  people  of  Kentucky  to  the  Union;  but 
it  required  the  greatest  possible  prudence  and  the  wisest  statesmanship 
to  direct  the  public  mind  to  the  real  question  presented  by  the  seces- 


lo  Joshua  Fry  Speed. 

sionists;  and  there  was  danger,  imminent  and  threatening,  that  Ken- 
tucky might  falter  upon  the  question  as  it  was  so  artfully  and  so  per- 
sistently urged,  "Are  you  going  South,  or  are  you  going  North?"  And 
numbers  of  our  best  men  grew  impatient  at  what  they  called  the  "timid 
policy  "  of  the  more  cautious,  and  insisted  upon  declaring  openly  for 
the  Union  and  "coercion."  Mr.  Speed,  in  the  frequent  discussions 
growing  out  of  this  condition  of  things,  displayed  his  high  qualities 
of  courage,  prudence,  and  a  matchless  self-control.  He  was  for  the 
Union  under  all  circumstances,  without  condition — but  he  recognized 
the  force  and  power  of  our  geographical  and  social  connection  with 
the  South,  and  of  the  prejudices  as  well  which  grew  out  of  it.  His 
aim  was  to  hold  Kentucky  until  the  sober  thought  of  her  people 
should  bring  them  to  see  clearly  and  unmistakably  the  real  designs  of 
the  secessionists — the  real  issue  which  they  presented — when  he  felt 
doubly  sure  that  they  would  never  abandon  the  Union  and  the  old 
flag.  To  this  end  he  worked  intelligently,  earnestly,  and  persistently, 
and  his  influence  was  felt  all  over  the  State. 

The  election  in  August,  1861,  resulted  in  the  return  of  an  orer- 
whelming  majority  of  Union  men  to  the  General  Assembly.  That  body 
met  early  in  September  of  the  same  year,  and  shortly  after  its  meeting 
passed  resolutions  taking  a  firm  stand  for  the  Union,  directing  the 
raising  of  troops  for  the  Federal  service,  and  for  borrowing  money 
from  the  banks  of  the  State  for  subsistence,  equipment,  etc.  A  com- 
mittee of  the  General  Assembly  was  sent  to  Louisville  to  negotiate 
with  the  banks  of  that  city.  The  sums  asked  for  seemed  large  as 
things  then  looked  (yet  it  would  hardly  be  considered  a  sufiicient 
guarantee  for  a  season  of  opera  now).  There  was  a  hesitancy  on  the 
part  of  one  or  two  of  the  banks,  notably  one  of  them,  and  Mr.  Speed's 
services  were  again  called  into  requisition.  His  interview  with  the 
hesitating  officials  was  brief,  but  it  was  pointed  and  earnest.  It  was 
successful. 

In  the  organization  of  our  Kentucky  volunteer  soldiers,  and  in  the 
general  conduct  of  our  State  affairs,  particularly  during  1861-2,  there 
were  questions  of  interest  and  difficulty  very  frequently  arising  between 
the  General  Government  and  that  of  the  State,  and  between  the  Na- 
tional and  State  military  officials.  There  were  wants  to  be  supplied, 
arms  for  recruits,  munitions  of  war,  etc.,  for  our  volunteers  ;  and  besides 
"the  want  of  confidence  in  the  loyalty  of  the  Border  States"  which 
manifested  itself  almost  daily  among  some  of  the  Federal  officials  at 
"Washington,  tliere  was  real  difficulty  in  procuring  the  much-needed 
arms  and  supplies,  etc.,  because  it  often  happened  the  Government  did 
not  have   them,  and  could  not  get  them.     In  all  these  and  kindred 


jfoshua  Fry  Speed.  1 1 

difficulties  and  troubles,  the  State  Military  Board  and  officials 
had  recourse  to  Mr.  Speed.  He  was  at  all  times  prompt  to  respond  to 
any  call  upon  him,  and  ready  to  go  to  Washington  when  his  services 
were  deemed  of  value  or  importance  to  the  State.  His  influence  with 
Mr.  Lincoln  was  potent.  He  knew  that  Mr.  Lincoln  loved  Kentucky, 
and  had  confidence  in  the  truth  and  loyalty  of  her  people  who  had  de- 
clared for  the  Union.  His  mission  was  uniformly  successful.  All  these 
things  he  did  so  quietly  and  so  modestly  "  that  one  scarce  knew  it  was 
doing  until  it  was  done." 

His  position  was  peculiar:  without  at  anytime  an  office,  civil  or 
military,  he  was  the  trusted  confidant,  adviser  and  counselor  of  both 
the  civil  and  military  authorities  of  the  State  and  Nation  all  through 
the  rebellion.  He  was  a  man  of  few  words,  often  painfully  reticent, 
never  in  a  hurry,  never  disconcerted  ;  he  seemed  intuitively  to  know 
the  right  thing  to  do,  and  the  right  time  to  do  it.  His  compensation 
was  found  alone  in  the  consciousness  of  duty  performed.  He  uniformly 
declined  to  receive  pay  for  any  time  or  effort  he  was  asked  to  give  to 
the  cause  of  his  country. 

In  my  judgment,  no  citizen  of  the  Commonwealth  rendered  larger 
or  more  important  and  effective  service  to  the  Union  cause  in  Ken- 
tucky, during  all  the  dark  days  of  the  rebellion,  than  did  that  noble 
gentleman  and  patriotic  citizen,  Joshua  F.  Speed. 

From  the  close  of  the  war  until  his  failing  health 
which  preceded  his  death,  he  devoted  himself  to  his  bus- 
iness. He  also  engaged  in  many  enterprises  affecting 
the  progress  and  welfare  of  the  city.  He  was  a  project- 
or of  the  "  Short  Line "  Railroad,  and  director  in  the 
company.  Director  in  the  Louisville  &  Bardstown  Turn- 
pike Company,  the  Louisville  Cement  Company,  Sav- 
ings Bank  of  Louisville,  Talmage  Ice  Company,  Lou- 
isville Hotel  Company.  During  this  period  of  his  life 
he  was  one  of  the  most  conspicuous  business  men  in 
Louisville. 

In  1867  he  purchased  a  beautiful  tract  of  land,  near 
the  old  Farmington  homestead,  lying  on  the  waters  of 


1 2  yoshiia  Fry  Speed. 

Beargrass  Creek,  about  two  and  a  half  miles  from  the 
city.  There  he  built  a  residence,  and  beautified  the 
place  with  landscape  gardening.  He  planted  almost  every 
species  of  tree  that  grows  in  this  latitude,  flowering  plants 
and  shrubbery,  and  built  extensive  conservatories.  There 
he  and  his  devoted  wife  lived  over  again,  amid  the  fra- 
grance and  beauty  of  flowers,  the  earlier  years  of  their 
married  life. 

In  1874  they  visited  California.  One  of  his  lectures 
is  an  account  of  this  trip. 

His  devotion  to  his  wife  was  complete.  When  absent 
from  her  his  letters  were  full  of  the  tenderest  sentiment. 
Many  beautiful  extracts  might  be  published,  but  two  will 
suffice: 

I  wrote  to  you  yesterday,  and  to-day,  having  some  leisure,  I  will 
write  again  upon  the  principle,  I  suppose,  that  where  your  treasure  is 
there  will  your  heart  go.  My  earthly  treasure  is  in  you;  not  like  the 
treasures  only  valuable  in  possession;  not  like  other  valuables  acquir- 
ing increased  value  from  increased  quantity ;  but,  satisfied  with  each 
other,  we  will  go  down  the  hill  of  life  together,  as  we  have  risen. 

The  following  is  an  extract  from  a  letter  written  from 
home  to  his  wife  at  Chautauqua : 

Last  evening,  as  I  sat  upon  the  porch  watching  the  sun  set,  as  we 
usually  do,  I  thought  of  you  and  wished  for  you.  Old  Sol  sank  to 
rest  in  the  arms  of  night  so  grandly,  giving  some  new  beauty  with 
each  expiring  ray. 

It  seemed  as  though  the  clouds  had  more  beautiful  phantasms  of 
every  shape  and  form,  like  bridesmaids  and  bridegrooms,  wailing  in 
graceful  attendance  upon  the  wedding  of  day  and  night,  than  I  ever 
saw  before.  Night,  like  the  blushing  bride,  was  coy  and  shy,  and  gave 
evidence  of  her  modesty  in  her  blushing  cheeks,  while  day,  like  a 
gallant  knight,  who  had  won  his  spurs  upon  the  bloody  battle-field  in 
the  heady  current  of  the  fight,  had  done  his  duty,  laid  aside  his  hel- 
met and  his  spear,  and  approached  his  bride  in  the  rich  and  beautiful 


Joshua  Fry  Speed.  13 

garb  of  a  lover.  The  wedding  over,  the  stars  came  out,  like  guests  in- 
vited to  the  feast,  and,  I  suppose,  kept  up  the  carousal  till  dawn  of 
day.     I  retired,  and  give  no  further  report. 

For  his  brothers  and  sisters  he  had  the  warmest  affec- 
tion, and  felt  bound  to  them  by  the  strongest  ties  of 
fraternal  regard  and  confidence.  This  was  manifested 
in  many  ways  and  to  the  close  of  his  life. 

One  of  his  notable  characteristics  was  his  abstracted- 
ness. He  was  a  constant  worker  and  thinker.  The  de- 
mands of  business  pressed  constantly  upon  his  mind;  this 
often  caused  him  to  fail  to  recognize  persons  he  met. 
On  one  occasion  his  wife,  seeing  him  upon  the  street, 
caused  her  carriage  to  drive  to  the  side-walk  and  she 
called  to  him.  He  turned  and,  seeing  a  lady  in  a  carriage, 
approached,  unconscious  who  it  was.  Seeing  this  she 
exclaimed,  **  Why,  Joshua,  are  you  crazy!"  He  said, 
"Why,  Fanny,  I  didn't  know  you."  On  account  of  this 
characteristic  he  was  often  misjudged,  his  mental  ab- 
straction being  taken  for  indifference. 

His  life  was  full  of  noble,  kind,  and  generous  deeds. 
He  was  liberal  in  his  charities,  and  especially  through 
his  wife  relieved  the  wants  of  thousands. 

Another  characteristic  was  entire  absence  of  ostenta- 
tion. He  had  no  taste  for  display.  No  one  but  the 
beneficiary  knew  of  his  charity.  It  may  be  said  with  the 
strongest  emphasis,  his  left  hand  knew  not  what  his  right 
hand  did.  He  was  charitable  in  his  judgments.  It  was 
almost  an  unknown  thing  for  him  to  condemn  others. 

He  has  no  children,  but  his  kindness  and  gentleness 
to  children  was  most  striking.     Nor  did  he  ever  blame 


14  jfoshna  Fry  Speed. 

others  for  too  great  parental  fondness  or  indulgence.  To 
his  numerous  nephews  and  nieces  he  endeared  himself 
by  his  kindness  and  consideration.  Some  of  them  were 
almost  always  inmates  of  his  house,  and  all  regarded  him 
with  great  fondness  and  admiration.  Fanny  Henning,  the 
youngest  daughter  of  James  Henning,  was  loved  like  a 
daughter.     Her  death  at  his  house  was  a  deep  affliction. 

He  was  a  believer  in  the  Christian  religion.  He  often 
said  he  believed  the  Bible,  not  because  he  understood 
it  all,  but  because  he  believed  it  was  God's  Word ;  that, 
if  he  could  understand  it,  he  would  not  believe  it  was 
God's  Word.  Years  before  his  death  he  often  said  he 
expected  to  be  in  the  communion  of  the  Church  before 
he  died.  And  so  it  was.  He  united  with  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church. 

The  failure  of  the  Savings  Bank  of  Louisville  was  a 
great  shock  to  him.  At  that  time,  January,  1881,  his 
health  had  begun  to  fail,  but  he  rallied  his  strength  and 
energies  to  make  the  best  of  that  unfortunate  wreck.  His 
last  efforts  in  business  were  in  behalf  of  the  assets  of  that 
bank.  When  he  had  done  all  that  his  efforts  could  do, 
he  began  to  decline  under  the  power  of  a  disease  which 
had  troubled  him  for  years.  He  gave  up  business  and 
sought  relief  at  health  resorts. 

He  spent  the  winter  of  188 1-2  at  Nassau.  Returning, 
he  died  May  29,  1882.  He  had  possession  of  his  men- 
tal faculties  to  the  last,  and  ended  a  noble  and  busy  life 
in  peace  with  all  men,  and  with  a  good  hope  of  a  blessed 
immortality. 


REMINISCENCES  OF  ABRAHAM  LINCOLN. 


Ladies  and  Gentlemen: 

In  appearing  before  you  to-night  to  give  some  reminis- 
cences of  the  life  of  my  early  and  much  loved  friend, 
Abraham  Lincoln,  I  approach  the  subject  with  diffidence, 
and  with  a  full  sense  that  I  am  all-unequal  to  the  task  of 
delineating  the  character  of  a  man  whose  name  now  fills 
the  world,  and  whose  character  is  studied  by  think- 
ing men  in  every  language,  and  is  revered  by  all. 

Pardon  me,  if  I  devote  a  few  words  upon  myself  and 
the  State  of  Illinois,  in  which  I  spent  my  early  man- 
hood. 

The  spring  of  1835  found  me  a  merchant  in  the  then 
village  of  Springfield,  with  one  thousand  two  hundred 
inhabitants,  now  a  great  city  of  twenty  thousand  inhabi- 
tants. Then  the  population  was  sparse,  the  settlements 
being  near  the  timber,  and  around  the  prairie,  no  one 
dreaming  that  those  vast  prairies  would  ever  be  entered, 
but  that  they  would  be  held  by  the  Government,  and 
used  perpetually  as  grazing  fields  for  their  stock.  They 
had  then  no  roads  across  them,  save  those  made  by  the 
movers,  then  coming  from  the  States  south  and  east, 
principally  Kentucky,  Tenessee,  Ohio,  and  New  York. 
These  came  with  long  trains  of  wagons   covered  with 


1 6  Abraham  Lincoln. 

white  sheets,  filled  with  women  and  children,  beds,  bed- 
ding, and  light  furniture,  all  bound  westward.  The 
movers  were  of  all  grades  and  classes  of  society,  from 
the  cultivated  ladies  and  gentlemen  with  ample  means 
to  the  poor  man  who  owns  not  more  than  his  clothes, 
and  who  chopped  wood  and  did  work  in  the  camp  and 
drove  the  oxen  as  compensation  for  the  privilege  of  mov- 
ing with  the  train.  Now,  as  I  saw  the  State  a  few  days 
ago,  long  lines  of  railroad  trains  have  taken  the  place  of 
the  wagon  trains,  the  iron  rail  has  taken  the  place  of  the 
wagon  rut,  and  the  steam-engine  has  usurped  the  place 
of  the  ox-team. 

Never  shall  I  forget  the  grand  prairie  as  I  first  saw  it, 
in  the  fall  of  1834.  Then,  covered  with  grass  as  high  as 
our  wheat,  waving  in  the  breeze  and  resembling  the  bil- 
lows of  the  ocean  as  the  shadows  of  the  fleeting  clouds 
passed  over  it.  Sometimes  the  prairie  was  lit  up  by  the 
burning  grass,  and  as  the  flames  were  seen  in  the  dis- 
tance, like  a  ribbon  of  fire  belting  the  horizon,  it  would 
almost  seem  that  the  distant  clouds  were  on  fire.  Now 
you  have  cultivated  fields,  large  farms  with  stately 
houses,  and  cities  and  towns  with  their  numerous  fac- 
tories and  mills,  and  every  kind  of  modern  building.  It 
is  pleasing  to  see  this  progress.  Then  every  thing  was 
plenty  and  every  thing  cheap.  Now  every  thing  plenty, 
but  every  thing  is  dear.  Springfield,  the  capital  of  the 
State,  is  as  near  to  New  York  now  as  she  was  to  St. 
Louis  then. 

In  the  spring  of  1836  I  first  saw  Abraham  Lincoln. 


Abraham  Lincoln.  1 7 

He  had  been  a  laborer,  a  flatboatman,  a  deputy  survey- 
or, and  for  one  term  a  member  of  the  legislature.  I 
heard  him  spoken  of  by  those  who  knew  him  as  a  won- 
derful character.  They  boasted  that  he  could  outwrestle 
any  man  in  the  county,  and  that  he  could  beat  any  law- 
yer in  Springfield  speaking. 

In  1836  he  was  a  candidate  for  re-election,  and  I  believe 
I  heard  the  first  speech  he  ever  made  at  the  county-seat. 

At  that  time  there  were  but  two  parties.  Whig  and 
Democrat.  Lincoln  was  a  Whig  and  the  leading  man 
upon  the  ticket.  I  was  then  fresh  from  Kentucky,  and 
had  heard  many  of  her  great  orators.  It  seemed  to  me 
then,  as  it  seems  to  me  now,  that  I  never  heard  a  more 
effective  speaker.  He  carried  the  crowd  with  him  and 
swayed  them  as  he  pleased.  So  deep  an  impression  did 
he  make,  that  George  Forquer,  a  man  of  much  celebrity 
as  a  sarcastic  speaker  and  great  State  reputation  as  an 
orator,  rose  and  asked  the  people  to  hear  him.  He  com- 
menced his  speech  by  saying  that  this  young  man  would 
have  to  be  taken  down,  and  he  was  sorry  that  the  task 
devolved  upon  him.  He  made  what  was  called  one  of 
his  slasher-gafif  speeches,  dealing  much  in  ridicule  and 
sarcasm.  Lincoln  stood  near  him  with  his  arms  folded, 
never  interrupting  him.  When  Forquer  was  done  Lin- 
coln walked  to  the  stand,  and  replied  so  fully  and  com- 
pletely that  his  friends  bore  him  from  the  court-house  on 
their  shoulders. 

So    deep  an    impression  did    this  first  speech  make 
upon  me  that  I  remember  its  conclusion  now. 


1 8  Abraham  Li7icoln. 

Said  he,  "  The  gentleman  commenced  his  speech  by 
saying  that  this  young  man  will  have  to  be  taken  down, 
and  he  was  sorry  that  the  task  devolved  upon  him.  I 
am  not  so  young  in  years  as  I  am  in  the  tricks  and 
trades  of  a  politician  ;  but,  live  long,  or  die  young,  I 
would  rather  die  now,  than,  like  the  gentleman,  change 
my  politics,  and  simultaneous  with  the  change  receive 
an  office  worth  ^3,000  per  year,  and  then  have  to  erect 
a  lightning-rod  over  my  house  to  protect  a  guilty  con- 
science from  an  offended  God."  To  understand  the  point 
of  this,  Forquer  had  been  a  Whig,  but  changed  his  poli- 
tics, and  had  been  appointed  register  of  the  land  office, 
and  over  his  house  was  the  only  lightning-rod  in  the 
town  or  county.  Lincoln  had  seen  it  for  the  first  time 
on  the  day  before.  Not  understanding  its  properties,  he 
made  it  a  study  that  night  by  aid  of  a  book,  bought  for 
the  purpose,  till  he  knew  all  about  it. 

The  same  quality  of  mind  that  made  him  look  into 
and  understand  the  use  and  properties  of  that  lightning- 
rod  made  him  study  and  understand  all  he  saw.  No 
matter  how  ridiculous  his  ignorance  upon  any  subject 
might  make  him  appear,  he  was  never  ashamed  to  ac- 
knowledge it ;  but  he  immediately  addressed  himself  to 
the  task  of  being  ignorant  no  longer. 

The  life  of  a  great  and  good  man  is  like  the  current 
of  a  great  river.  When  you  see  its  force  and  power,  you 
at  once  think  of  its  source,  and  what  tributaries  go  to 
make  the  great  river.  England  is  expending  vast  sums 
now  to  discover  the  source  of  the  Nile,  and  our  own 


Abrahmn  Lincoln.  19 

government  at  considerable  expense  sent  an  expedition 
to  explore  the  Amazon  and  its  valleys.  So  the  student  of 
history,  when  he  hears  of  a  great  man  who  has  attracted 
attention,  desires  to  know  whence  he  came,  what  was 
his  origin,  his  habits  of  thought  and  study,  and  all 
the  elements  of  his  character. 

Lincoln  studied  and  appropriated  to  himself  all  that 
came  within  his  observation.  Every  thing  that  he  saw, 
read,  or  heard,  added  to  the  store  of  his  information — 
because  he  thought  upon  it.  No  truth  was  too  small  to 
escape  his  observation,  and  no  problem  too  intricate  to 
escape  a  solution,  if  it  was  capable  of  being  solved. 
Thought,  hard,  patient,  laborious  thought,  these  were  the 
tributaries  that  made  the  bold,  strong,  irresistible  cur- 
rent of  his  life.  The  great  river  gets  its  aliment  from 
the  water-shed  that  feeds  it,  and  from  the  tributaries 
naturally  flowing  into  it.  Lincoln  drew  his  supplies 
from  the  great  store-house  of  nature.  Constant  thought 
enabled  him  to  use  all  his  information  at  all  times  and 
upon  all  subjects  with  force,  ease,  and  grace. 

As  far  as  he  knew,  and  it  was  only  by  tradition,  his 
ancestors  came  from  England  with  Penn  and  settled  in 
Pennsylvania.  Thence  they  drifted  down  to  Virginia ; 
thence  to  Kentucky,  where  Lincoln  was  born  on  the 
1 2th  of  February,  1809,  on  the  banks  of  Nolin,  in  what 
was  then  Hardin  County,  now  Larue.  He  went  from  Ken- 
tucky to  Indiana,  where  he  lost,  as  he  always  called  her, 
his  "  angel  mother"  at  ten  years  of  age.  From  Indiana, 
with  his  father  and  step-mother,  he  went  to  Illinois. 


20  Abraham  Lincoln. 

Leaving  his  father  and  step-mother  in  Macon  County, 
he  pushed  on  to  Sangamon  County,  and  stopped  at  New 
Salem,  on  the  Sangamon  River,  where  he  became  a 
boatman  and  made  two  trips  to  New  Orleans.  While  a 
flatboatman  he  studied  that  subject,  as  he  did  every 
thing  else,  and  invented  a  machine  for  lightening  flat- 
boats  over  shoals,  a  model  of  which  is  in  the  Patent 
Office  now. 

He  resided  at  New  Salem  about  eight  years.  The 
society  was  rough,  the  young  men  were  all  wild,  and  full 
of  fun  and  frolic.  All  the  manly  sports  that  pertained 
to  a  frontier  life  were  in  vogue  there.  Running,  wrest- 
ling, jumping,  gander-pulling,  and  horse-racing.  In  all 
the  games  and  races,  in  which  he  was  not  engaged,  he 
was  always  selected  as  one  of  the  judges.  From  the 
justness  of  his  decisions  on  all  occasions  he  was  called 
Honest  Abe.  As  he  grew  older,  and  until  his  death,  his 
sobriquet  was  "  Honest  old  Abe." 

In  the  spring  of  1837  he  took  his  license  as  a  law- 
yer. Then  began  with  him  the  real  battle  of  life. 
Leaving  the  field  of  his  youthful  sports,  pleasures,  and 
pains,  where  he  was  the  leading  man,  he  came  to  a  bar 
then  considered  the  best  in  the  State,  and  perhaps  as 
good  as  any  in  the  West.  He  entered  with  diffidence 
upon  his  new  career,  coming  in  contact  with  Logan 
and  Cyrus  Walker,  older  than  he  and  men  of  renown, 
John  J.  Hardin,  E.  D,  Baker,  Douglas,  and  Browning,  all 
near  his  own  age.  They  were  all  educated  men,  in  the 
ordinary  acceptation  of  the  word.     They  had  read  many 


Abraham  Lincoln.  21 

books,  and  studied  law,  many  of  them  with  able  lawyers. 
He  had  read  but  few  books,  but  had  studied  those. 
They  were  such  as  he  borrowed  from  his  friend,  John  T. 
Stuart,  with  whom  he  formed  a  partnership.  He  studied 
them  at  his  humble  home  on  the  banks  of  the  Sanga- 
mon, without  a  preceptor  or  fellow  student.  With  such 
preparation  he  came  to  bar.  From  this  time  forward  he 
took  a  leading  position  in  the  State. 

It  was  in  the  spring  of  1837,  and  on  the  very  day  that 
he  obtained  his  license,  that  our  intimate  acquaintance 
began.  He  had  ridden  into  town  on  a  borrowed  horse, 
with  no  earthly  property  save  a  pair  of  saddle-bags  con- 
taining a  few  clothes.  I  was  a  merchant  at  Springfield, 
and  kept  a  large  country  store,  embracing  dry  goods, 
groceries,  hardware,  books,  medicines,  bed-clothes,  mat- 
tresses, in  fact  every  thing  that  the  country  needed.  Lin- 
coln came  into  the  store  with  his  saddle-bags  on  his  arm. 
He  said  he  wanted  to  buy  the  furniture  for  a  single  bed. 
The  mattress,  blankets,  sheets,  coverlid,  and  pillow,  ac- 
cording to  the  figures  made  by  me,  would  cost  seventeen 
dollars.  He  said  that  was  perhaps  cheap  enough  ;  but, 
small  as  the  sum  was,  he  was  unable  to  pay  it.  But  if  I 
would  credit  him  till  Christmas,  and  his  experiment  as  a 
lawyer  was  a  success,  he  would  pay  then,  saying,  in  the 
saddest  tone,  "  If  I  fail  in  this,  I  do  not  know  that  I  can 
ever  pay  you."  As  I  looked  up  at  him  I  thought  then, 
and  think  now,  that  I  never  saw  a  sadder  face. 

I  said  to  him,  "You  seem  to  be  so  much  pained  at 
contracting  so  small  a  debt,  I  think  I  can  suggest  a  plan 


22  Abraham  Lincoln. 

by  which  you  can  avoid  the  debt  and  at  the  same  time 
attain  your  end.  I  have  a  large  room  with  a  double  bed 
up-stairs,  which  you  are  very  welcome  to  share  with  me." 

"Where  is  your  room?"  said  he. 

"  Up-stairs,"  said  I,  pointing  to  a  pair  of  winding 
stairs  which  led  from  the  store  to  my  room. 

He  took  his  saddle-bags  on  his  arm,  went  up  stairs, 
set  them  down  on  the  floor,  and  came  down  with  the 
most  changed  countenance.  Beaming  with  pleasure  he 
exclaimed,  "  Well,  Speed,  I  am  moved !  " 

Mr.  Lincoln  was  then  twenty-seven  years  old — a  law- 
yer without  a  client,  no  money,  all  his  earthly  wealth 
consisting  of  the  clothes  he  wore  and  the  contents  of  his 
saddle-bags.  For  me  to  have  seen  him  rise  from  this 
humble  position,  step  by  step,  till  he  reached  the  Presi- 
dency— holding  the  reins  of  government  in  as  trying 
times  as  any  government  ever  had — accomplishing  more 
during  the  four  years  of  his  administration  than  any 
man  had  ever  done — keeping  the  peace  with  all  foreign 
nations  under  most  trying  circumstances — putting  down 
the  most  gigantic  rebellion  ever  known — assassinated  at 
fifty-eight  years  of  age — borne  to  his  final  resting  place 
in  Illinois,  amid  the  tears  of  the  nation  and  of  the  civil- 
ized world,  and  even  his  former  foes  in  arms  acknowl- 
edging they  had  lost  their  best  friend — seems  more  like 
fable  than  fact. 

From  the  commencement  of  his  political  career  he 
was  the  acknowledged  standard-bearer  of  the  Whig  party 
in  the  State,  and  his  supremacy  was  never  questioned. 


Abraham  Lincoln.  23 

As  a  lawyer,  after  his  first  year,  he  was  acknowledged 
among  the  best  in  the  State.  His  analytical  powers 
were  marvelous.  He  always  resolved  every  question 
into  its  primary  elements,  and  gave  up  every  point  on 
his  own  side  that  did  not  seem  to  be  invulnerable.  One 
would  think,  to  hear  him  present  his  case  in  the  court, 
he  was  giving  his  case  away.  He  would  concede  point 
after  point  to  his  adversary  until  it  would  seem  his  case 
was  conceded  entirely  away.  But  he  always  reserved 
a  point  upon  which  he  claimed  a  decision  in  his  favor, 
and  his  concession  magnified  the  strength  of  his  claim. 
He  rarely  failed  in  gaining  his  cases  in  court. 

Mr.  Lincoln  was  a  social  man,  though  he  did  not  seek 
company  ;  it  sought  him.  After  he  made  his  home  with 
me,  on  every  winter's  night  at  my  store,  by  a  big  wood 
fire,  no  matter  how  inclement  the  weather,  eight  or  ten 
choice  spirits  assembled,  without  distinction  of  party. 
It  was  a  sort  of  social  club  without  organization.  They 
came  there  because  they  were  sure  to  find  Lincoln.  His 
habit  was  to  engage  in  conversation  upon  any  and  all 
subjects  except  politics. 

One  evening  a  political  argument  sprang  up  between 
Lincoln  and  Douglas,  which  for  a  time  ran  high.  Doug- 
las sprang  to  his  feet  and  said,  "  Gentlemen,  this  is  no 
place  to  talk  politics  ;  we  will  discuss  the  questions  pub- 
licly with  you." 

A  few  days  after  the  Whigs  held  a  meeting,  and  chal- 
lenged the  Democrats  to  a  joint  debate.  The  challenge 
was  accepted,  and  Douglas,  Lamborn,  Calhoun,  and  Jesse 


24  Abraham  Lincoln. 

B.  Thomas  were  selected  by  the  Democrats,  Logan, 
Baker,  Browning,  and  Lincoln  were  selected  by  the 
Whigs.  Such  intellectual  giants  of  course  drew  a 
crowded  house.  The  debate  took  place  in  the  Presby- 
terian church,  and  lasted  for  eight  nights,  each  speaker 
taking  one  night.  Like  true  knights  they  came  to  fight 
in  intellectual  armor  clad.  They  all  stood  high,  and  each 
had  his  followers,  adherents,  and  admirers.  This  was  in 
January,  1840. 

Lincoln's  speech  was  published  as  a  campaign  docu- 
ment. The  conclusion  of  that  speech,  as  an  evidence  of 
his  style  at  that  early  day  is,  I  think,  worth  repeating 
here: 

"  If  ever  I  feel  the  soul  within  me  elevate  and  expand 
to  those  dimensions  not  wholly  unworthy  of  its  Divine 
Architect,  it  is  when  I  contemplate  the  cause  of  my 
country,  deserted  by  all  the  world  beside,  and  I  standing 
up  boldly  and  alone,  hurling  defiance  at  her  victorious 
oppressors.  Here,  without  contemplating  consequences, 
before  heaven  and  in  the  face  of  the  world,  I  swear  eter- 
nal fealty  to  the  just  cause,  as  I  deem  it,  of  the  land  of 
my  life,  my  liberty,  and  my  love.  And  who,  that  thinks 
with  me,  will  not  fearlessly  adopt  the  oath  I  take !  Let 
none  falter  who  thinks  he  is  right,  and  we  may  succeed. 
But  if,  after  all,  we  shall  fail,  be  it  so  ;  we  still  have  the 
proud  consolation  of  saying  to  our  consciences,  and  to 
the  departed  shade  of  our  country's  freedom,  that  the 
cause  approved  of  our  judgments  and  adored  of  our 
hearts  we  never  faltered  in  defending." 


Abraham  Lincoln.  25 

Mr.  Lincoln  delivered  this  speech  without  manuscript 
or  notes.  It  filled  seven  columns  in  the  Sangamon 
Journal,  and  was  pronounced  by  all  who  heard  it  as  ex- 
actly what  he  had  said.  He  had  a  wonderful  faculty  in 
that  way.  He  might  be  writing  an  important  document, 
be  interrupted  in  the  midst  of  a  sentence,  turn  his  atten- 
tion to  other  matters  entirely  foreign  to  the  subject  on 
which  he  was  engaged,  and  take  up  his  pen  and  begin 
where  he  left  off  without  reading  the  previous  part  of 
the  sentence.  He  could  grasp,  exhaust,  and  quit  any 
subject  with  more  facility  than  any  man  I  have  ever 
seen  or  heard  of. 

Lincoln  had  the  tenderest  heart  for  any  one  in  dis- 
tress, whether  man,  beast,  or  bird.  Many  of  the  gentle 
and  touching  sympathies  of  his  nature,  which  flowered 
so  frequently  and  beautifully  in  the  humble  citizen  at 
home,  fruited  in  the  sunlight  of  the  world  when  he  had 
power  and  place.  He  carried  from  his  home  on  the 
prairies  to  Washington  the  same  gentleness  of  disposi- 
tion and  kindness  of  heart.  Six  gentlemen,  I  being 
one,  Lincoln,  Baker,  Hardin,  and  others  were  riding 
along  a  country  road.  We  were  strung  along  the  road 
two  and  two  together.  We  were  passing  through  a 
thicket  of  wild  plum  and  crab-apple  trees.  A  violent 
wind-storm  had  just  occurred.  Lincoln  and  Hardin 
were  behind.  There  were  two  young  birds  by  the  road- 
side too  young  to  fly.  They  had  been  blown  from  the 
nest  by  the  storm.  The  old  bird  was  fluttering  about  and 
wailing  as  a  mother  ever  does  for  her  babes.     Lincoln 


26  Abraham  Lincoln. 

stopped,  hitched  his  horse,  caught  the  birds,  hunted  the 
nest  and  placed  them  in  it.  The  rest  of  us  rode  on  to 
a  creek,  and  while  our  horses  were  drinking  Hardin  rode 
up.  "  Where  is  Lincoln,"  said  one  }  "  Oh,  when  I  saw 
him  last  he  had  two  little  birds  in  his  hand  hunting  for 
their  nest."  In  perhaps  an  hour  ^le  came.  They  laughed 
at  him.  He  said  with  much  emphasis,  "  Gentlemen,  you 
may  laugh,  but  I  could  not  have  slept  well  to-night,  if 
I  had  not  saved  those  birds.  Their  cries  would  have 
rung  in  my  ears."  This  is  one  of  the  flowers  of  his 
prairie  life.     Now  for  the  fruit. 

The  last  time  I  saw  him  was  about  two  weeks  before  his 
assassination.  He  sent  me  word  by  my  brother  James, 
then  in  his  Cabinet,  that  he  desired  to  see  me  before  I 
went  home.  I  went  into  his  office  about  eleven  o'clock. 
He  looked  jaded  and  weary,  I  staid  in  the  room  until 
his  hour  for  callers  was  over  ;  he  ordered  the  door  closed, 
and,  looking  over  to  where  I  was  sitting,  asked  me  draw 
up  my  chair.  But  instead  of  being  alone,  as  he  sup- 
posed, in  the  opposite  direction  from  where  I  sat,  and 
across  the  fire-place  from  him,  sat  two  humble-looking 
women.  Seeing  them  there  seemed  to  provoke  him,  and 
he  said,  "Well,  ladies,  what  can  I  do  for  you  .^ "  One 
was  an  old  woman,  the  other  young.  They  both  com- 
menced talking  at  once.  The  President  soon  compre- 
hended them.  "  I  suppose,"  said  he,  "  that  your  son  and 
your  husband  are  in  prison  for  resisting  the  draft  in 
Western  Pennsylvania.  Where  is  your  petition  .?"  The 
old  lady  replied,  "Mr.  Lincoln,  I've  got  no  petition;  I 


Abraham  Lincoln.  27 

went  to  a  lawyer  to  get  one  drawn,  and  I  had  not  the 
money  to  pay  him  and  come  here  too  ;  so,  I  thought  I 
would  just  come  and  ask  you  to  let  me  have  my  boy." 
"And  it's  your  husband  you  want,"  said  he,  turning  to 
the  young  woman  ?     "  Yes,"  said  she. 

He  rung  his  bell  and  called  his  servant,  and  bade  him 
to  go  and  tell  Gen.  Dana  to  bring  him  the  list  of  pris- 
oners for  resisting  the  draft  in  Western  Pennsylvania. 

The  General  soon  came,  bringing  a  package  of  papers. 
The  President  opened  it,  and,  counting  the  names,  said, 
"  General,  there  are  twenty-seven  of  these  men.  Is  there 
any  difference  in  degree  of  their  guilt .''  "  "  No,"  said  the 
General,  "  It  is  a  bad  case,  and  a  merciful  finding." 
"  Well,"  said  the  President,  looking  out  of  the  window  and 
seemingly  talking  to  himself,  "  these  poor  fellows  have,  I 
think,  suffered  enough;  they  have  been  in  prison  fifteen 
months.  I  have  been  thinking  so  for  some  time,  and 
have  so  said  to  Stanton,  and  he  always  threatened  to 
resign  if  they  are  released.  But  he  has  said  so  about 
other  matters,  and  never  did.  So  now,  while  I  have  the 
paper  in  my  hand,  I  will  turn  out  the  flock."  So  he 
wrote,  "  Let  the  prisoners  named  in  the  within  paper  be 
discharged,"  and  signed  it.  The  General  made  his  bow 
and  left.  Then,  turning  to  the  ladies,  he  said,  "  Now 
ladies,  you  can  go.  Your  son,  madam,  and  your  husband, 
madam,  is  free." 

The  young  woman  ran  across  to  him  and  began  to 
kneel.  He  took  her  by  the  elbow  and  said,  impatiently, 
"  Get  up,  get  up;  none  of  this."     But  the  old  woman 


28  Abraham  Lincoln. 

walked  to  him,  wiping  with  her  apron  the  tears  that  were 
coursing  down  her  cheeks.  She  gave  him  her  hand,  and 
looking  into  his  face  said,  "  Good-bye,  Mr.  Lincoln,  we 
will  never  meet  again  till  we  meet  in  Heaven."  A 
change  came  over  his  sad  and  weary  face.  He  clasped 
her  hand  in  both  of  his,  and  followed  her  to  the  door, 
saying  as  he  went,  "  With  all  that  I  have  to  cross  me 
here,  I  am  afraid  that  I  will  never  get  there ;  but  your 
wish  that  you  will  meet  me  there  has  fully  paid  for  all  I 
have  done  for  you." 

We  were  then  alone.  He  drew  his  chair  to  the  fire 
and  said,  "  Speed,  I  am  a  little  alarmed  about  myself; 
just  feel  my  hand."     It  was  cold  and  clammy. 

He  pulled  off  his  boots,  and,  putting  his  feet  to  the 
fire,  the  heat  made  them  steam.  I  said  overwork  was 
producing  nervousness.  "No,"  said  he,  "  I  am  not  tired." 
I  said,  "  Such  a  scene  as  I  have  just  witnessed  is  enough 
to  make  you  nervous."  "  How  much  you  are  mistaken," 
said  he ;  "I  have  made  two  people  happy  to-day ;  I 
have  given  a  mother  her  son,  and  a  wife  her  husband. 
That  young  woman  is  a  counterfeit,  but  the  old  woman 
is  a  true  mother." 

This  is  the  fruit  of  the  flower  we  saw  bloom  in  the 
incident  of  the  birds. 

Mr.  Lincoln  was  a  cool,  brave  man.  His  physical 
courage  was  never  questioned.  His  moral  courage  was 
grand.  He  was  cautious  about  expressing  himself 
against  public  sentiment  v/hen  it  would  do  no  good; 
but  when  it  became  necessary  he  did  so  with  emphasis, 
earnestness,  and  force. 


Abraham  Lincoln.  29 

When  the  Whig  party  struck  its  colors,  he  had  to 
choose  between  the  Republican  and  Democratic  parties. 
He  allied  himself  with  the  Republican.  Many  of  his 
old  Whig  friends  went  with  the  Democrats.  He  called 
a  meeting  and  made  a  speech,  which  for  power  and 
beauty  his  friends  say  was  never  excelled. 

The  Whigs  who  had  honored  him  were  more  bitter 
toward  him  than  the  Democrats.  By  this  speech  all 
personal  asperities  were  quieted.  The  contest  rose  from 
the  low  level  of  personal  abuse  to  the  high  plane  of  in- 
tellectual combat.  It  was  really  almost  impossible  to 
have  a  personal  controversy  with  him.  These  were 
some  of  the  flowers  that  bloomed  on  the  prairie.  As 
President  he  had  no  personal  controversies. 

On  one  occasion,  when  Kentucky  was  overrun,  Nel- 
son had  been  beaten  in  battle  near  Richmond,  and  lay 
wounded    in    Cincinnati.     Ohio,    Indiana,    and    Illinois 
were  alarmed,  and  Kentucky  aroused.     A  self  consti- 
tuted committee  of  distinguished  gentlemen  determined 
to  go  and  advise  with  the  President  as  to  what  was  best 
to  be  done.     I  happened  to  be  present  at  the  interview. 
The  committee  was  composed  of  able  and  distinguished 
men.     Senator  Lane  opened  for  Indiana,  Garret  Davis 
followed  for  Kentucky,  and  other  gentlemen  for  Ohio 
and  Illinois.     They  all  had  complaints  to  make  of  the 
conduct  of  the  war  in  the  West.     Like  the  expression  in 
the   Prayer-book,   the  Government  was  "doing  every 
thing  it  ought  not  to  do,  and  leaving  undone  every  thing 
it  ought  to  do." 


30  Abraham  Liticoln. 

The  President  sat  on  a  revolving  chair,  looking  at 
every  one  till  they  were  all  done.  I  never  saw  him  ex- 
hibit more  tact  or  talent  than  he  did  on  this  occasion. 
He  said,  "  Now,  gentlemen,  I  am  going  to  make  you  a 
curious  kind  of  a  speech.  I  announce  to  you  that  I  am 
not  going  to  do  one  single  thing  that  any  one  of  you 
has  asked  me  to  do.  But  it  is  due  to  myself  and  to  you 
that  I  should  give  my  reasons."  He  then  from  his  seat 
answered  each  man,  taking  them  in  the  order  in  which 
they  spoke,  never  forgetting  a  point  that  any  one  had 
made.  When  he  was  done,  he  rose  from  his  chair  and 
said,  "Judge  List,  this  reminds  me  of  an  anecdote 
which  I  heard  a  son  of  yours  tell  in  Burlington  in  Iowa. 
He  was  trying  to  enforce  upon  his  hearers  the  truth  of 
the  old  adage  that  three  moves  is  worse  than  a  fire.  As 
an  illustration  he  gave  an  account  of  a  family  who 
started  from  Western  Pennsylvania,  pretty  well  off  in 
this  world's  goods  when  they  started.  But  they  moved 
and  moved,  having  less  and  less  every  time  they  moved, 
till  after  a  while  they  could  carry  every  thing  in  one 
wagon.  He  said  that  the  chickens  of  the  family  got  so 
used  to  being  moved,  that  whenever  they  saw  the  wagon 
sheets  brought  out  they  laid  themselves  on  their  backs 
and  crossed  their  legs,  ready  to  be  tied.  Now,  gentle- 
men, if  I  were  to  listen  to  every  committee  that  comes  in 
at  that  door,  I  had  just  as  well  cross  my  hands  and  let 
you  tie  me.  Nevertheless  I  am  glad  to  see  you."  He 
left  him  in  good  humor,  and  all  were  satisfied.  The 
patience,  kindness,  and  tact  he  showed  on  this  occasion 
was  another  fruit  of  the  prairie  flower. 


Abraham  Lincoln.  3 1 

Lincoln  was  fond  of  anecdotes,  and  told  them  well. 
It  was  a  great  mental  relief  to  him.  All  great  thinkers 
must  have  mental  relaxation.  He  did  not  know  one 
card  from  another,  therefore  could  not  play.  He  never 
drank,  and  hated  low  company.  Fault  has  been  found 
by  some  fastidious  persons  with  his  habit  of  story-tell- 
ing— in  other  words,  with  his  method  of  illustration  by 
means  of  anecdote.  It  is  said  this  was  undignified.  A 
fable,  a  parable,  or  an  anecdote,  is  nothing  more  than 
illustrating  a  real  case  by  an  imaginary  one.  A  posi- 
tive statement  embraces  but  one  case,  while  a  fable,  a  par- 
able, or  an  anecdote  may  cover  a  whole  class  of  cases. 

Take,  for  instance,  his  conversation  with  W.  C.  Reeves, 
of  Virginia,  whom  he  greatly  admired.  Reeves  came 
with  other  gentlemen  from  Richmond  soon  after  his  in- 
auguration. A  convention  was  in  session  in  Richmond 
to  decide  whether  Virginia  would  go  out  or  stay  in  the 
Union.  Mr.  Reeves  was  a  Union  man,  and  proceeded 
to  advise  the  President.  His  advice  was,  to  surrender 
Forts  Sumpter  and  Pickens,  and  all  the  property  of  the 
Government  in  the  Southern  States.  Mr.  Lincoln  asked 
him  if  he  remembered  the  fable  of  the  Lion  and  the 
Woodsman's  Daughter.  Mr.  Reeves  said  that  he  did 
not.  .^sop,  said  the  President,  reports  that  a  lion  was 
very  much  in  love  with  a  woodsman's  daughter.  The 
fair  maid,  afraid  to  say  no,  referred  him  to  her  father. 
The  lion  applied  for  the  girl.  The  father  replied,  your 
teeth  are  too  long.  The  lion  went  to  a  dentist  and  had 
them   extracted.     Returning,   he   asked   for   his   bride. 


32  Abraham  Lincoln. 

No,  said  the  woodsman,  your  claws  are  too  long.  Going 
back  to  the  dentist,  he  had  them  drawn.  Then,  return- 
ing to  claim  his  bride,  the  woodsman,  seeing  that  he 
was  disarmed,  beat  out  his  brains.  "  May  it  not  be  so," 
said  Mr.  Lincoln,  "  with  me,  if  I  give  up  all  that  is 
asked." 

I  have  often  been  asked  what  were  Mr.  Lincoln's 
religious  opinions.  When  I  knew  him,  in  early  life,  he 
was  a  skeptic.  He  had  tried  hard  to  be  a  believer,  but 
his  reason  could  not  grasp  and  solve  the  great  problem 
of  redemption  as  taught.  He  was  very  cautious  never 
to  give  expression  to  any  thought  or  sentiment  that  would 
grate  harshly  upon  a  Christian's  ear.  For  a  sincere  Chris- 
tian he  had  great  respect.  He  often  said  that  the  most 
ambitious  man  might  live  to  see  every  hope  fail ;  but,  no 
Christian  could  live  to  see  his  fail,  because  fulfillment 
could  only  come  when  life  ended.  But  this  was  a  sub- 
ject we  never  discussed.  The  only  evidence  I  have  of 
any  change,  was  in  the  summer  before  he  was  killed. 
I  was  invited  out  to  the  Soldier's  Home  to  spend  the 
night.  As  I  entered  the  room,  near  night,  he  was  sit- 
ting near  a  window  intently  reading  his  Bible.  Ap- 
proaching him  I  said,  "  I  am  glad  to  see  you  so  profit- 
ably engaged."  "  Yes "  said  he,  "  I  am  profitably  en- 
gaged." "  Well,"  said  I,  "  If  you  have  recovered  from 
your  skepticism,  I  am  sorry  to  say  that  I  have  not." 
Looking  me  earnestly  in  the  face,  and  placing  his  hand 
on  my  shoulder,  he  said,  "  You  are  wrong  Speed,  take 
all  of  this  book  upon  reason  that  you  can,  and  the  bal- 


Abraham  Lincoln.  33 

ance  on  faith,  and  you  will  live  and  die  a  happier  and 
better  man." 

I  am  indebted  for  the  following  to  Judge  Gillespie, 
one  of  Mr,  Lincoln's  most  trusted  and  intimate  friends, 
who  occasionally  went  to  Washington  to  see  him.  Want- 
ing no  office,  he  was  always  welcome.  The  Judge  says, 
Mr.  Lincoln  once  said  to  me  that  he  could  never  recon- 
cile the  prescience  of  the  Deity  with  the  uncertainty  of 
events.  But  he  thought  it  would  be  profitless  to  teach 
his  views. 

The  Judge  adds,  I  asked  him  once  what  was  to  be 
done  with  the  South  after  the  rebellion  was  put  down. 
He  said  some  thought  their  heads  ought  to  come  off; 
but,  said  he,  if  it  was  left  to  me,  I  could  not  tell  where 
to  draw  the  line  between  those  whose  heads  should 
come  off,  and  those  whose  heads  should  stay  on.  He 
said  that  he  had  recently  been  reading  the  history 
of  the  rebellion  of  Absalom,  and  that  he  inclined  to 
adopt  the  views  of  David.  Said  he,  "  When  David  was 
fleeing  from  Jerusalem  Shimei  cursed  him.  After  the 
rebellion  was  put  down  Shimei  craved  a  pardon,  Abishai, 
David's  nephew,  the  son  of  Zeruiah,  David's  sister,  said, 
'  This  man  ought  not  to  be  pardoned,  because  he 
cursed  the  Lord's  anointed.'  David  said,  'What  have 
I  to  do  with  you,  ye  sons  of  Zeruiah,  that  you  should 
this  day  be  adversaries  unto  me.  Know  ye  that  not  a 
man  shall  be  put  to  death  in  Israel.' " 

This  was  like  his  anecdotes,  and  was  illustrative  of 
what   he   thought  would   come  about.      He  would   be 

3 


34  Abraham  Lincoln. 

pressed  to  put  men  to  death  because  they  had  rebelled. 
But,  like  David,  he  intended  to  say,  "  Know  ye  that 
not  a  man  shall  be  put  to  death  in  Israel." 

Mr.  Lincoln's  person  was  ungainly.  He  was  six  feet 
four  inches  in  height ;  a  little  stooped  in  the  shoulders  ; 
his  legs  and  arms  were  long  ;  his  feet  and  hands  large ; 
his  forehead  was  high.  His  head  was  over  the  average 
size.  His  eyes  were  gray.  His  face  and  forehead  were 
wrinkled  even  in  his  youth.  They  deepened  in  age, 
"as  streams  their  channels  deeper  wear."  Generally  he 
was  a  very  sad  man,  and  his  countenance  indicated  it. 
But  when  he  warmed  up  all  sadness  vanished,  his  face 
was  radiant  and  glowing,  and  almost  gave  expression  to 
his  thoughts  before  his  tongue  could  utter  them.  If  I 
was  asked  what  it  was  that  threw  such  charm  around 
him,  I  would  say  that  it  was  his  perfect  naturalness. 
He  could  act  no  part  but  his  own.  He  copied  no  one 
either  in  manner  or  style.  His  style  was  more  florid  in 
the  published  speeches  of  his  early  life  than  his  later 
productions. 

I  wish  here  to  record  what  I  heard  Senator  Sumner 
say  of  him  and  of  his  style : 

He  said  "  He  had  read  with  great  interest,  all  of  Lin- 
coln's published  speeches,  and  particularly  the  volume 
of  debates  with  Douglas.  That  while  there  is  no  speech 
in  that  book  artistic  from  its .  base  to  summit,  there  is 
no  speech  of  his  in  which  you  will  not  find  gems  of 
English  excelled  by  none.  But,"  said  he,  "of  all  the 
speeches  he  ever  read,   in  any  language,  by  any  man 


Abraham  Lincoln.  35 

living  or  dead,  he  thought  Lincoln's  Gettysburg  speech 
was  the  greatest."  Lincoln  said,  "  The  world  will  little 
note,  nor  long  remember  what  we  say  here,  but  it  never 
can  forget  what  they  did  here."  Sumner  said  "  the  speech 
would  live  when  the  memory  of  the  battle  would  be 
lost,  or  only  be  remembered  because  of  the  speech." 

I  have  often  thought  of  the  characters  of  the  two 
great  rivals,  Lincoln  and  Douglas.  They  seemed  to 
have  been  pitted  against  each  other  from  1836  till 
Lincoln  reached  the  Presidency.  They  were  the  re- 
spective leaders  of  their  parties  in  the  State.  They 
were  as  opposite  in  character  as  they  were  unlike  in  their 
persons.  Lincoln  was  long  and  ungainly.  Douglas, 
short  and  compact.  Douglas,  in  all  elections,  was  the 
moving  spirit  in  the  conduct  and  management  of  an 
election,  he  was  not  content  without  a  blind  submission 
to  himself  He  could  not  tolerate  opposition  to  his  will 
within  his  party  organization.  He  held  the  reins  and 
controlled  the  movement  of  the  Democratic  chariot. 
With  a  large  State  majority,  with  many  able  and  ambi- 
tious men  in  it,  he  stepped  to  the  front  in  his  youth 
and  held  it  till  his  death. 

Mr.  Lincoln,  on  the  other  hand,  shrank  from  any  con- 
troversy with  his  friends.  Being  in  a  minority  in  the 
State  he  was  forced  to  the  front,  because  his  friends 
thought  he  was  the  only  man  with  whom  they  could 
win.  In  a  canvass  his  friends  had  to  do  all  the  manage- 
ment. He  knew  nothing  of  how  to  reach  the  people 
except  by  addressing  their  reason.     If  the  situation  had 


36  Abraham  Lincoln. 

been  reversed,  Lincoln  representing  the  majority,  and 
Douglas  the  minority,  I  think  it  most  likely  Lincoln 
would  never  have  had  place.  He  had  no  heart  for  a 
fight  with  friends. 

Mr.  Lincoln  had  a  wonderful  power  for  entertaining 
and  amusing  all  classes  and  grades  of  society. 

As  an  evidence  of  his  power  of  entertainment,  I  re- 
late an  incident  I  got  from  Judge  Gillespie,  who  got  it 
from  Judge  Peck,  who  was  one  of  the  party.  In  1843, 
when  Mr.  Van  Buren  and  Commodore  Paulding  visited 
the  West,  and  gave  out  that  they  would  reach  Springfield 
a  certain  day,  but  their  friends  knew  from  the  condition 
of  the  roads  that  their  expectations  could  not  be  realized, 
a  party  was  formed,  and  Lincoln,  though  not  of  their 
politics,  was  pressed  into  service.  They  met  Van  Buren 
and  his  party  at  Rochester,  in  Sangamon  County,  in  an 
old  barn  of  a  hotel.  Lincoln  was  charged  to  do  his  best 
to  entertain  the  distinguished  guests.  Well  did  he  do 
his  part.  Lincoln  soon  got  under  way  and  kept  the 
company  convulsed  with  laughter  till  the  small  hours  of 
the  night.  Mr.  Van  Buren  stayed  some  days  in  Spring- 
field, and  repeatedly  said  he  never  spent  so  agreeable  a 
night  in  his  life.  He  complained  that  his  sides  were 
sore  with  laughter,  and  to  more  than  one  predicted  for 
that  young  man  a  bright  and  brilliant  future. 

His  fondness  for  his  step-mother  and  his  watchful  care 
over  her  after  the  death  of  his  father  deserves  notice.  He 
could  not  bear  to  have  any  thing  said  by  any  one  against 
her.     Not  a  great  while  before  his  death  he  was  direct- 


Abraham  Lijtcoln.  37 

ing  a  letter  to  her,  and  told  me  that  he  was  discharging 
a  most  agreeable  duty.  He  then  spoke  of  his  affection 
for  her  and  her  kindness  to  him.  He  said  he  could  not 
bear  to  leave  the  State  for  four  years  without  going  to 
see  her.  A  few  days  before  he  left  home  he  visited  her, 
and  staid  all  night.  In  the  morning,  as  he  bade  her  good- 
bye, she  looked  at  him  and  said,  "Good-bye,  Abraham; 
I  shall  never  see  you  again,  you  will  never  come  back 
alive."  The  earnestness  of  her  look  he  said  sometimes 
haunted  him.     Alas !  how  true  the  prediction. 

Lincoln  in  all  his  soul  loved  peace  and  avoided  strife. 
He  had  often  calmed  and  quieted  the  angry  passions  of 
men  in  his  own  way,  and  in  his  own  State  and  county. 
For  oeace  he  would  sacrifice  all  save  honor.    To  have 

1. 

avoided  war  he  would  have  yielded  much.  But  it  was 
impossible  for  him  to  have  surrendered  his  honor  or 
tarnished  his  fame  by  being  faithless  to  the  great  trust 
imposed  upon  him  by  his  election  to  the  Presidency. 
The  conclusion  of  his  first  inaugural  reflects  his  feel- 
ings as  a  mirror : 

"  In  your  hands,  my  dissatisfied  fellow  countrymen,  and 
not  in  mine,  is  the  momentous  issue  of  civil  war.  The 
Government  will  not  assail  you.  You  can  have  no  con- 
flict without  being  yourselves  the  aggressors.  You  can 
have  no  oath  registered  in  heaven  to  destroy  the  Gover- 
ment,  while  I  shall  have  the  most  solemn  one  to  pre- 
serve, protect,  and  defend  it.  I  am  loath  to  close.  We 
are  not  enemies  but  friends.  We  must  not  be  enemies. 
Though  passion  may  have  strained,  it  must  not  break 


38  Abraham  Lincoln. 

our  bonds  of  afifection.  The  mystic  chords  of  memory, 
stretching  from  every  battle-field  and  patriot  grave  to 
every  living  heart  and  hearthstone  all  over  this  broad 
land,  will  yet  swell  the  chorus  of  the  Union,  when  again 
touched,  as  suiely  they  will  be,  by  the  better  angels  of 
our  nature." 

Thus  he  pleaded  for  peace  on  the  very  threshold  of 
his  administration.  But  war  came — he  kept  his  oath 
to  preserve,  protect,  and  defend.  In  his  last  inaugural, 
when  he  could  almost  see  the  end  of  the  rebellion,  he 
says,  "  With  charity  for  all,  with  malice  toward  none,  let 
us  pursue  the  right  as  God  has  given  us  the  light  to  see 
the  right."  These  sentiments  were  the  fruiting  of  the 
sweet  flowers  that  bloomed  on  the  prairie. 

Mr.  Lincoln  was  a  man  of  great  common  sense.  He 
was  a  common  man  expanded  into  giant  proportions; 
well  acquainted  with  the  people,  he  placed  his  hand  on 
the  beating  pulse  of  the  Nation,  judged  of  its  disease, 
and  was  ever  ready  with  a  remedy.  He  had  an  abiding 
faith  in  the  good  sense  and  intuitions  of  the  people. 
Wendell  Phillips  aptly  described  him  as  the  Indian  hun- 
ter, who  lays  his  ear  to  the  ground  and  listens  for  the 
tramp  of  the  coming  millions. 

I  have  often  been  asked  where  Lincoln  got  his  style. 
His  father  had  but  few  books.  The  Bible,  Esop's  Fa- 
bles, Weems's  Life  of  Washington,  and  Bunyan's  Pil- 
grim's Progress.  These  he  almost  committed  to  memory. 
From  these  I  suppose  he  got  his  style.  His  mind  was 
not  quick,  but  solid  and  retentive.     It  was  like  polished 


Abraham  Lincoln,  39 

steel,  a  mark  once  made  upon  it  was  never  erased.  His 
memory  of  events,  of  facts,  dates,  faces,  and  names,  sur- 
prised every  one. 

In  the  winter  of  1841  a  gloom  came  over  him  till  his 
friends  were  alarmed  for  his  life.  Though  a  member 
of  the  legislature  he  rarely  attended  its  sessions.  In 
his  deepest  gloom,  and  when  I  told  him  he  would  die 
unless  he  rallied,  he  said,  "  I  am  not  afraid,  and  would 
be  more  than  willing.  But  I  have  an  irrepressible 
desire  to  live  till  I  can  be  assured  that  the  world  is  a 
little  better  for  my  having  lived  in  it."  A  noble  and 
commendable  ambition.  It  is  for  posterity  to  say  wheth- 
er his  ambition  was  gratified.  Four  millions  of  slaves 
were  made  freemen  by  his  proclamation,  and  the  princi- 
ple engrafted  in  the  Constitution  of  his  country,  that,  for 
all  time,  men  and  women  shall  not  be  bought  and  sold. 
If  it  be  permitted  him  to  look  back  upon  the  land  of  his 
love,  how  gratified  he  must  be  to  see  that  no  party  in  this 
broad  land  opposes  the  great  principles  he  advocated 
and  established.  Even  now  the  mystic  chords  of  mem- 
ory, stretching  from  every  battle-field  and  patriot  grave 
to  every  living  heart  and  hearthstone  all  over  the  land, 
is  swelling  the  chorus  of  the  Union,  and  all  hearts  are 
touched  by  the  better  angels  of  our  nature. 

In  early  summer  of  1841  Mr.  Lincoln  came  to  Ken- 
tucky and  spent  several  months  at  Farmington,  the 
home  of  my  mother,  near  this  city.  On  his  return  to 
Illinois,  thinking  that  some  recognition  of  the  kindness 
shown  him  was  due,  he  wrote  a  letter  to  my  sister,  Miss 


40  Abraham  Lincoln. 

Mary  Speed,  in  which  he  gives  among  other  things  an 
account  of  his  trip  on  a  steamboat  from  Louisville  to  St. 
Louis,  and  though  the  letter  has  been  published  I  will 
here  give  a  portion  of  it. 

The  scene  he  describes  bears  so  intimate  a  relation  to 
his  after-life,  I  think  it  probable  that  it  may  be  consid- 
ered as  concentrating  his  opposition  to  slavery.  He  says, 
"A  fine  example  was  presented  on  board  the  boat  for 
contemplating  the  effect  of  condition  upon  human  happi- 
ness. A  gentleman  had  purchased  twelve  negroes  in 
different  parts  of  Kentucky,  and  was  taking  them  to  a 
farm  in  the  South.  They  were  chained  six  and  six  to- 
gether, a  small  iron  clevis  was  around  the  left  wrist  of 
each,  and  this  fastened  to  the  main  chain  by  a  shorter 
at  a  convenient  distance  from  the  others,  so  that  the  ne- 
groes were  strung  together  precisely  like  so  many  fish 
upon  a  trot-line.  In  this  condition  they  were  being  sep- 
arated forever  from  the  scenes  of  their  childhood,  their 
friends,  their  fathers  and  mothers,  and  brothers  and  sis- 
ters, and  many  of  them  from  their  wives  and  children, 
and  going  into  perpetual  slavery,  where  the  lash  of  the 
master  is  proverbially  more  ruthless  than  any  where  else ; 
and  yet  amid  all  these  distressing  circumstances,  as  we 
would  think  them,  they  were  the  most  cheerful  and  ap- 
parently happy  people  on  board.  One,  whose  offense  for 
which  he  was  sold  was  an  over-fondness  for  his  wife, 
played  the  fiddle  almost  continually,  and  others  danced, 
sung,  cracked  jokes,  and  played  various  games  with  cards 
from  day  to  day.     How  true  it  is  that  '  God  tempers  the 


Abraham  Lincoln.  41 

wind  to  the  shorn  lamb,'  or,  in  other  words,  that  he  ren- 
ders the  worst  of  human  conditions  tolerable,  while  he 
permits  the  best  to  be  nothing  better  than  tolerable." 

With  the  tender,  sympathetic  nature  such  as  his  was — 
when  the  question  came,  should  this  institution  be  car- 
ried into  the  Territories  or  should  its  boundaries  be  cir- 
cumscribed— is  it  a  wonder  that  he  arrayed  himself 
against  its  extension  ?  or  that,  in  the  times  when  the 
Southern  States  claimed  the  right  to  secede  because 
the  institution  was  in  danger,  and  when  they  made  the 
slaves,  not  soldiers,  but  producers  for  their  soldiers,  he  was 
more  than  willing  to  strike  slavery  dead  ?  It  was  one  of 
the  means  in  his  hands  for  putting  down  the  rebellion. 
He  used  it.  Mankind  will  say  whether  he  was  right  or 
wrong.  He  held  the  thunderbolt  in  his  hand,  but 
paused  for  one  hundred  days  before  he  hurled  it.  Then 
he  would  not  have  taken  it  back  if  he  could,  and  could 
not  if  he  would. 

I  have  alluded  to  Mr.  Lincoln's  firmness.  Perhaps  in 
America  no  such  contest  has  ever  taken  place  as  that 
between  Lincoln  and  Douglas.  Each  was  the  chosen 
leader  of  his  respective  party.  Each  had  been  nomi- 
nated by  conventions  as  candidate  for  the  United  States 
Senate.  They  were  to  stump  the  State  as  the  chosen 
representatives  of  the  principles  of  their  respective  par- 
ties. Mr.  Lincoln,  after  accepting  the  nomination,  was  to 
make  his  opening  speech,  which  he  did  to  a  crowded 
house  in  Springfield  on  the  17th  of  June,  1858.  Before 
he  delivered  it  he  called  a  council  of  his  friends,  twelve 


42  Abraham  Lincoln. 

in  number,  and  read  it  slowly  and  deliberately  to  them. 
In  that  speech  he  says, " '  A  house  divided  against  itself 
can  not  stand.'  I  believe  this  Government  can  not  en- 
dure permanently  half  slave  and  half  free.  I  do  not 
expect  to  se2  the  house  fall ;  but  I  do  expect  it  will 
cease  to  be  divided.  It  will  become  all  one  thing  or  all 
the  other."  Eleven  of  his  friends  objected  to  this  part 
of  it  and  strenuously  urged  him  to  leave  it  out.  Mr. 
Lincoln  sat  still  a  moment,  then,  rising,  strode  rapidly 
up  and  down  the  room  and  said,  "Gentlemen,  I  have 
thought  much  upon  this,  and  it  must  remain.  If  it  must 
be  that  I  go  down  because  of  this  speech,  then  let  me 
go  down  linked  to  truth.  This  nation  can  not  live  on 
injustice — a  house  divided  against  itself  can  not  stand. 
I  say  it  again,  and  again." 

He  here  evinced  a  firmness  where  principle  was  in- 
volved, but  any  of  those  present  could  have  controlled 
him  in  the  conduct  and  management  of  the  campaign. 
In  the  management  of  the  fight  he  would  have  nothing 
to  do,  but  in  the  principles  upon  which  he  would  make 
it  he  would  be  supreme.     , 

No  better  evidence  of  the  affection  of  the  American 
people  could  be  given  than  has  been  shown  in  the  erec- 
tion of  the  monument  to  his  memory  at  Springfield  at  a 
cost  of  near  ^200,000.  ^61,500  was  contributed  by  the 
States  of  Illinois,  Missouri,  New  York,  and  Nevada.  The 
balance  came  into  the  treasury  of  the  Monumental  As- 
sociation without  effort.  The  Association  is  out  of  debt, 
with  sufficient  means  in  the  treasury  to  take  care  of  the 


Abraham  Lincoln.  43 

grounds  and  keep  watch  over  the  monument  and  to 
show  to  pilgrims  now  daily  visiting  it.  It  stands  upon 
a  lot  of  seven  acres,  donated  by  the  Oak  Ridge  Cemetery. 

It  was  my  good  fortune  to  be  present  at  the  unvailing 
of  the  statue  (which,  by  the  way,  is  the  best  likeness  of 
him  I  had  ever  seen).  The  statue  is  ten  feet  high,  but 
stands  on  a  pedestal  so  high  that  from  the  ground  it 
does  not  appear  to  be  more  than  life  size.  In  his  right 
hand  is  the  scroll  of  his  emancipation  with  the  pen  he 
used  in  affixing  his  name  to  it.  At  his  feet  is  the 
American  Coat  of  Arms.  The  laurel,  the  emblem  of 
peace,  which  was  tendered  to  his  foes  in  his  first  inaugu- 
ral and  rejected,  is  in  the  talons  of  the  eagle ;  while  the 
proud  bird  has  a  broken  chain  in  her  beak,  representing 
the  broken  chain  of  slavery.  On  either  side  of  him  are 
bronze  groups  of  the  army  and  navy,  the  instruments 
to  preserve  the  Government  and  put  down  the  rebellion. 

It  was  my  good  fortune  to  witness  the  unvailing  of 
the  statue.  It  was  draped  with  the  American  flag.  As 
the  orator.  Gov.  Oglesby,  closed  his  oration,  he  turned 
and,  pointing  to  the  statue,  said,  "  Behold  the  image  of 
the  man."  The  vail  was  then  withdrawn.  Shout  after 
shout  rent  the  air  from  that  vast  crowd ;  but  far  more 
touching  and  tender  was  it  there,  among  his  friends  and 
neighbors,  to  see  tears  stream  from  the  eyes  of  many. 

I  have  given  some  of  my  reminiscences  in  the  life  of 
Abraham  Lincoln.  As  President  his  acts  stand  before 
the  world,  and  by  them  he  will  be  judged;  as  a  man, 
honest,  true,  upright,  and  just,  he  lived  and  died. 


NOTES,  REMINISCENCES,  AND  REFLECTIONS 


TRIP  TO  THE  PACIFIC  COAST  IN  1876. 


I  left  Louisville  May  9,  1876,  for  the  Pacific  Coast, 
with  my  wife  and  my  sister,  Mrs.  Breckinridge. 

It  is  useless  to  dwell  upon  the  trip  from  here  to  Chi- 
cago, and  thence  due  west  to  Omaha.  It  is  generally 
fine  rolling  prairie  skirted  with  timber,  as  you  cross  the 
various  streams  through  the  great  States  of  Illinois  and 
Iowa.  After  crossing  the  Missouri  River  at  Omaha,  you 
go  several  hundred  miles  through  Nebraska,  with  the 
same  undulating  prairie  and  ordinary  farm-houses,  full 
granaries,  and  great  herds  of  cattle,  sheep,  horses,  etc., 
indicative  of  a  prosperous  and  growing  country.  Then 
begins  the  desert  of  seven  hundred  miles,  on  which 
nothing  seems  to  grow  but  the  sage  bush.  There  are 
no  habitations  for  man  except  at  the  points  where  the 
railroad  employees  have  built  huts  for  their  convenience 
and  eating-stations  for  the  passengers.  These  always 
include  grog-shops  and  "  Bourbon"  whisky,  a  tablespoon- 
ful  of  which  will  nearly  kill  a  man. 

It  is  amusing  to  see  what  a  small  thing  will  attract 
the  attention  of  a  whole  train  in  this  lonely  and  vast 
desert.  The  Pacific  road  runs  for  several  hundred  miles 
along  and  in  sight  of  the  old  Mormon  trail,  or  the  overland 


Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast.  45 

route  to  California,  now  used  by  emigrants  to  the  Black 
Hills,  with  the  old  ox  and  horse  teams,  with  their  white 
wagon-sheets,  and  the  usual  accompaniment  of  women, 
white-haired  little  children,  dogs,  cows,  horses,  etc. 
Such  things  we  would  not  notice  at  home,  but  on  the 
plains  they  arrest  the  attention  of  all.  Men  and  women 
will  cease  to  look  upon  the  snow-clad  mountains  in 
the  distance,  where  the  snow  on  the  mountains  and 
the  white  clouds  in  the  sky  seem  to  meet  and  mingle  so 
that  you  can  scarcely  tell  the  one  from  the  other,  to  gaze 
at  an  emigrant  train. 

In  this  vast  desert  there  is  a  great  city,  about  twenty 
miles  in  length,  how  wide  we  do  not  know.  So  numer- 
ous are  its  inhabitants  that  no  census  has  ever  been 
taken,  or  ever  can  be  taken  of  its  population.  They 
have  none  of  the  vices  or  virtues  of  our  advanced  civil- 
ization— no  churches,  no  theaters,  no  coffee-houses,  no 
lager-beer  saloons,  no  plumed  hearses,  nor  big  funerals, 
no  fashionable  cemetery,  no  doctors,  nor  lawyers,  nor 
preachers,  no  church  quarrels,  no  Sabbath-schools,  no 
mayor,  or  common  council,  no  paid  police,  no  jail,  no 
paved  streets,  nor  city  taxes,  no  politicians,  no  elections. 
None  of  its  citizens  carry  concealed  weapons.  They 
care  nothing  for  mutations  of  trade,  the  price  of  stocks 
or  gold,  or  who  is  president.  They  know  nothing  of 
who  was  president  from  Washington  to  Hayes.  Noth- 
ing of  the  great  rebellion.     Blessed  ignorance ! 

This  great  city  is  known  as  prairie-dog  city.     The 
dogs  build  in  the  ground  where  they  live.     As  the  train 


46  Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast. 

passes  by  they  come  out  of  their  holes,  as  loungers  in 
others  villages  do,  to  gaze  at  the  passing  train.  In  stat- 
ure they  are  about  the  size  of  a  squirrel,  with  sharp 
noses,  small  ears  and  bushy  tails.  This  is  the  city  of 
the  desert. 

With  this  desert  begins  the  ascent  to  the  Rocky 
Mountains.  So  gradual  is  the  ascent  (about  seventy 
feet  to  the  mile)  that  you  seem  to  be  on  a  level  plain  till 
you  reach  the  top. 

Having  passed  through  the  ascent  you  reach  Sherman, 
said  to  be  the  highest  point  on  the  railroad  to  San  Fran- 
cisco, and  the  highest  railroad  point  in  the  world. 

You  may  imagine  our  surprise  when  on  the  top  of  the 
Rocky  Mountains.  Instead  of  finding  ourselves  on  a 
narrow  backbone  or  ridge,  as  we  had  imagined,  with 
hardly  enough  level  land  for  lovers  to  stand  upon  with- 
out the  support  of  each  other's  arms,  we  were  in  the  midst 
of  a  vast  plain,  thousands  of  miles  in  length  north  and 
south,  and  hundreds  of  miles  in  width  east  and  west.  It 
is  a  great  basin  of  wet,  level  prairie.  It  is  like  a  waiter 
with  a  rim  of  snow  clad  mountains  around  it.  In  this 
basin  are  collected  the  waters  which  go  in  part  to  make 
the  great  rivers  of  the  continent.  Those  flowing  east  go 
to  swell  the  waters  of  the  Missouri  and  Mississippi,  find- 
ing their  grave  in  the  Atlantic  Ocean,  through  the  Gulf 
of  Mexico.  Those  flowing  west  go  to  swell  the  waters 
of  the  Colorado,  and  find  their  grave  in  the  Pacific 
Ocean,  through  the  Gulf  of  California. 

I  could  but  think,  as  I  saw  these  infant  streams  on 


Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast.  47 

this  vast  plain,  winding  their  small  tortuous  ways  east 
and  west,  how  our  course  of  life,  from  infancy  to  old 
age,  was  like  unto  theirs.  They  played  together  on  this 
great  plain  as  did  we  in  our  early  years  upon  the 
small  school-grounds.  They  separate,  one  going  east 
and  the  other  west.  So  do  we.  They  go  leaping  and 
laughing  down  the  mountain  side,  gay  and  sparkling  in 
their  youth.  So  do  we.  They  soon  lose  their  identity 
in  the  great  rivers  they  join,  and  we  ours  in  the  great 
throng  of  the  world  that  we  join.  They  find  their  graves 
in  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  oceans,  far  apart,  and  we 
ours  in  the  great  ocean  of  eternity,  perhaps  much  further 
divided. 

Passing  over  this  basin  you  come  to  the  eastern  slope 
of  the  Rocky  Mountains,  where  the  scenery  becomes 
grand.  Here  you  see  Castle  Rock,  Pulpit  Rock,  and 
other  scenery,  each  object  having  some  fancied  resem- 
blance to  the  thing  from  which  it  takes  its  name.  As 
the  road  winds  around  the  foot  of  the  mountain,  and 
along  the  banks  of  Bear  River,  you  come  to  a  gorge 
in  the  mountain,  through  which  the  river  flows  at  a  fall 
of  about  six  hundred  feet  to  the  mile.  The  place  is 
called  Hell  Gate. 

I  could  but  think  that,  if  it  was  really  the  gate  to  that 
dreadfully  hot  place,  how  refreshing  that  cold,  cold  water 
would  be  to  the  parched  tongue  of  many  a  poor  suffer- 
ing sinner. 

Arrived  at  Ogden,  the  terminus  of  the  Union  Pacific 
Railroad ;  changed  cars  for  Salt  Lake  City,  forty  miles 


48  Trip  to  the  'Pacific  Coast, 

south,  where  we  arrived  Saturday  night,  May  13th,  hav- 
ing traveled  two  thousand  miles,  and  only  two  hours 
behind  time.  On  Sabbath  morning  went  to  the  M.  E. 
Church,  a  church  built  by  the  Church  Extension  Society 
of  that  denomination,  through  the  efforts  and  agency  of 
Chaplain  McCabe.  It  is  a  solid  and  beautiful  structure, 
larger  than  any  Methodist  church  in  this  city.  It  has 
a  large  organ,  and  is  capable  of  seating  twelve  hundred 
people.  It  was  a  very  rainy  day.  The  congregation 
numbered  only  thirty-five,  ourselves  included.  In  the 
afternoon  we  went  to  the  Mormon  Tabernacle.  It  is 
capable  of  seating  eight  thousand  people.  We  heard  a 
sermon  on  the  terrors  of  the  law.  The  preacher  proved, 
apparently  to  his  own  satisfaction,  that  the  coming  of 
Joe  Smith  was  foretold  by  John,  in  his  writings  from 
the  Island  of  Patmos,  and  that  he  had  suffered  and  died 
as  all  other  martyrs  in  the  cause  of  truth  have  suffered 
and  died. 

Monday  we  called  on  Mayor  Little,  to  whom  we  had 
letters  of  introduction.  We  found  him  a  very  agreeable 
and  intelligent  gentleman.  He  was  a  nephew  of  Brig- 
ham  Young.  He  regretted  very  much  that  his  family 
carriage  was  broken,  or  Mrs.  Little  would  call  upon  the 
ladies.  He  did  not  say  which  Mrs.  Little  would  have 
done  the  calling.  At  one  o'clock  he  called  for  me  with 
a  2:50  span  of  horses,  and  drove  me  up  the  canon  back 
of  the  city,  where  they  harness  the  wild  and  rushing 
water  of  the  mountain  gorge  and  tame  it  to  man's  use. 
Then  he  drove  me  to  all  the  principal  points  of  interest 


Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast.  49 

in  and  around  the  city,  pointing  out  the  harems  of 
Brigham  Young,  his  extensive  grounds,  and  the  houses 
erected  for  his  married  children,  twenty-one  in  number. 
Being  his  guest,  I  could  not  discuss  the  subject,  ever 
uppermost  in  my  mind — polygamy.  But  I  could  plainly 
see  that  he  had  but  little  patience  with  a  poor  one-wifed 
man  like  myself 

The  city  is  on  a  plain  at  the  foot  of  a  mountain  range, 
and  twelve  miles  distant  from  the  great  Salt  Lake.  It 
has  a  population  of  twenty-five  thousand;  five  thousand 
gentiles  and  twenty  thousand  Mormons.  Its  streets  are 
all  one  hundred  and  thirty-five  feet  wide,  wider  than  our 
Broadway.  It  is  watered  from  the  canon,  which  I  have 
mentioned,  east  of  the  city.  So  large  is  the  supply  of 
water,  that  in  every  street  and  on  each  side  of  every 
street,  between  the  side-walks  and  the  street,  they  have 
a  stream  of  pure  snow-water  about  eighteen  inches  wide 
and  nine  inches  deep,  limpid,  cool,  fresh,  and  ever 
flowing  at  a  fall  of  seventy  feet  to  the  mile. 

Next  day  took  the  cars  for  Great  Salt  Lake.  It  is 
one  hundred  miles  long  and  fifty  miles  wide.  In  it  are 
several  large  islands  of  solid  rock,  unfit  for  the  habita- 
tion of  man  or  beast.  There  are  mountains  in  the  midst 
of  this  inland  sea.  The  water  of  the  lake  is  thirty-three 
per  cent  more  salt  than  that  of  the  ocean.  Nothing  can 
live  in  it.  It  is  fed  by  two  large  fresh-water  rivers  and 
innumerable  small  streams  of  fresh  water.  It  has  no 
outlet  to  the  ocean,  known  to  man.  Two  small  steamers 
do  a  thriving  business   around  the  lake.     The  valleys 

4 


50  Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast. 

are  fertile,  and  the  mountains  abound  in  silver,  lead,  and 
gold.  We  saw  six  cars  containing  eight  tons  each  of 
silver  and  lead,  which  we  were  told  was  about  the  aver- 
age daily  shipment  over  that  one  road. 

Of  these  people  and  the  Mormon  civilization,  I  must 
say  it  is  wonderful.  They  have  their  schools,  banks, 
merchants,  mechanics,  publishing  houses,  newspapers, 
grog-shops,  billiard-saloons,  theaters,  street  railroads, 
comfortable  houses,  and  well-stocked  farms,  all  evidencing 
great  advances  for  so  new  a  country.  Another  evidence 
of  their  advanced  civilization,  they  have  had  a  split  in 
their  church  and  a  great  church  quarrel.  You  have 
nothing  of  that  kind  here. 

The  ladies  of  our  party,  in  the  sympathy  of  their 
natures,  were  much  concerned  for  the  poor  women, 
many  of  whom  had  to  be  content  to  be  wife  No.  i,  2,  3, 
4,  etc.,  up  to  30  or  40,  of  one  man,  not  pitying  at  all  the 
poor  men,  who  were  too  much  married.  In  riding  upon 
the  street  cars,  they  found  two  women,  who  acknowl- 
edged themselves  to  be  the  wives  of  one  husband.  The 
deluded  things,  they  said,  they  dared  to  be  happy. 

Hume  says  that,  at  the  advent  of  John  Knox  into 
Scotland,  bull-baiting  was  fashionable,  amused  the  peo- 
ple and  made  them  laugh.  The  old  Presbyterians  of 
that  day  did  not  object  so  much  to  the  cruelty  of  the 
sport  as  to  seeing  the  people  laugh ;  so  with  our  ladies 
as  to  these  women.     Now,  adieu  to  Salt  Lake  City. 

From  Salt  Lake  to  San  Francisco  is  by  rail.  Located 
*  at  the  Palace  Hotel,  said  to  be  the  largest  and  finest 


Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast.  5 1 

in  the  world.  Many  friends  called,  and,  though  far  from 
home,  we  did  not  feel  as  though  we  were  among 
strangers. 

Many  invitations  to  dine  and  to  ride.  But  our  ladies 
did  not  come  to  see  cities,  or  eat  dinners,  or  take  drives. 
They  came  to  see  nature.  Besides,  poor  things,  "They 
had  nothing  to  wear."  While  I  would  gladly  have  stayed 
a  month,  for  both  profit  and  pleasure,  I  had  to  do  their 
bidding  abroad,  as  I  do  at  home.  No  declaration  of  in- 
dependence will  stand  against  a  woman's  will,  unless 
you  are  prepared  to  fight  for  it  longer  than  our  fore- 
fathers did  to  make  their  Declaration  good.  As  we 
find  it  in  Louisville  it  is  here. 

Left  San  Francisco  May  21st  for  Santa  Cruz.  This 
is  a  town  of  six  thousand  inhabitants,  one  hundred  and 
fifty  miles  south  of  San  Francisco  by  rail  and  on  the 
Pacific.  On  the  day  after  our  arrival  a  lunch  was  pre- 
pared, and  an  excursion  tendered  us  up  the  caiion  back 
of  the  city,  on  a  narrow-gauge  road,  to  the  big  trees 
(the  red-wood  of  the  Pacific).  Accepting  it,  we  saw 
many  things  that  were  pleasing,  and  much  that  was 
frightful.  The  narrow  little  road  spanned  chasms  several 
hundred  feet  deep,  on  trestle  work,  and  hugged  the 
mountain  side  five  hundred  feet  above  the  level  below. 

Here  we  saw  a  family  living  in  a  hollow  tree,  with 
beds,  bedding,  and  all  the  paraphernalia  of  house-keep- 
ing. They  cooked,  however,  out  of  doors.  In  Santa 
Cruz  was  the  finest  floral  display  we  saw  in  California. 
Here  the  lots  are  generally  large,  but  whether  large  or 


52  Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast. 

small,  are  all  well  set  with  flowers.  The  fuchsia  and 
geranium,  the  cloth  of  gold  and  lamark  roses  grow  in 
great  luxuriance  and  wild  profusion.  The  people  are  all 
polite  to  tourists. 

The  grandest  floral  display  I  have  ever  seen  was  in  an 
old  Spanish  orchard,  lying  in  the  suburbs  of  the  town. 
About  fifty  apple  trees  as  large  as  our  largest,  and  said 
to  be  one  hundred  years  old,  were  there.  The  cloth  of 
gold  and  lamark  roses,  beautiful  climbers,  had  climbed 
up  the  bodies  of  the  trees,  and  wound  themselves  around 
and  through  the  branches,  till  the  trees  seemed  to  have 
fruited  in  rich  clusters  of  flowers,  about  eight  or  ten  in 
a  cluster.  The  largest  sized  half- blown  roses  would 
about  fill  an  ordinary  glass  tumbler. 

At  Santa  Cruz  is  the  great  sugar  refinery,  where  they 
make  sugar,  from  beets  raised  in  the  neighborhood,  for 
the  whole  coast.  Here  too  are  the  powder  mills  for  the 
coast.  It  is  a  great  timber  market.  Here  you  have  a 
grand  view  of  the  Pacific  ocean,  with  a  long  beach  for 
driving  and  bathing.  The  star-fish,  the  rock  borer,  and 
the  sea  fern  are  among  the  rare  curiosities. 

Leaving  Santa  Cruz,  we  took  the  stage  across  the 
shore  mountains,  a  range  about  two  thousand  five  hun- 
dred feet  high,  running  near  the  ocean.  The  road  is  just 
wide  enough  for  the  stage  coach,  with  occasional  turn- 
outs for  two  coaches  to  pass.  Imagine  yourself  on  a 
narrow  veranda  without  a  railing,  hung  on  the  side  of 
the  mountain.  Looking  downward  and  upward,  you  are 
one  thousand  feet  from  the  bottom  below,  and  one  thou- 


Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast.  53 

sand  five  hundred  feet  below  the  top  of  the  mountain 
above.  On  the  summit  of  the  range  lives  Mountain  Char- 
lie, an  old  settler,  who  has  made  quite  a  fortune  by  graz- 
ing sheep  and  cattle.  His  person  is  all  disfigured  by  his 
early  fights  with  the  grizzly  bear.  A  few  years  ago  he 
thought  he  would  go  down  to  Santa  Cruz  to  educate  his 
children,  but  soon  returned  to  his  mountain  home  because 
his  children  could  not  walk  straight  on  level  ground. 
These  hills  are  very  fertile.  The  timber  is  all  red-wood ; 
and  for  the  undergrowth,  the  wild  azalia,  millions  of  acres, 
and  the  alder  tree,  at  that  time  all  in  full  bloom.  Here, 
too,  is  the  soap-plant,  which  the  inhabitants  use  for  wash- 
ing their  persons  and  clothes.  From  the  dust  we  encoun- 
tered it  would  seem  Nature,  in  her  beneficence,  has  pro- 
duced the  plant  just  where  it  is  most  needed. 

May  27th,  back  in  San  Francisco  again,  at  the  Palace 
Hotel.  Seven  miles  out  from  the  city,  we  went  to  see 
the  sea  lions  at  the  Cliff  House.  They  are  amphibious, 
and  bark  like  a  dog ;  they  weigh  from  four  hundred  to 
eight  hundred  pounds.  There  is  a  clump  of  island  rocks 
about  one  hundred  yards  from  the  shore,  some  sixty  feet 
high,  upon  which  these  sea  lions  are  ever  climbing  to 
sun  themselves,  and  plunging  from  the  top  of  the  rocks 
into  the  deep  sea.  The  largest  of  these  animals  is 
called  Ben  Butler.  We  rode  in  a  carriage  through 
the  park,  and  back  through  the  cemetery.  The  ceme- 
tery abounds  in  lying  epitaphs,  as  all  others  do.  If  there 
ever  was  an  unkind  husband  or  a  scolding  wife,  they 
were  never  buried  in  a  fashionable  cemetery,  that  is,  if 


54  Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast. 

you  believe  the  writing  on  their  tombs,  as  I  suppose  in 
charity  you  do. 

I  spent  the  next  two  days  in  looking  at  the  city  and  its 
surging  crowds  ;  looking  into  its  trade  and  commerce  as 
well  as  I  could  in  so  short  a  time.  California  Street  is 
the  chief  object  of  attraction.  Upon  this  street  are  the 
two  Board  of  Trade  halls,  both  larger  than  any  hall  we 
have  in  Louisville. 

Their  stocks  are  sold  at  auction,  and  millions  change 
hands  in  a  day.  The  streets  and  pavements  are  lined 
with  an  eager  and  anxious  crowd,  all  buying  and  sell- 
ing on  margins  or  for  cash,  each  hoping,  like  the 
gambler,  for  some  quick  return  and  great  profit.  The 
crowd  is  about  the  same  each  and  every  day,  and  com- 
posed of  all  classes  and  grades  of  society.  The  rich 
banker,  the  lawyer,  the  doctor,  the  preacher,  the  gam- 
bler, the  poor  laborer,  the  fashionable  ladies  of  the  city, 
and  the  poor  chambermaid,  all  meet  here,  and  for  a  time 
are  on  a  level.  Thus  it  goes  from  day  to  day ;  if  one 
fall  or  a  thousand  fall,  it  matters  not,  new  recruits  fill 
the  broken  ranks,  and  the  battle  goes  bravely  on.  They 
all  fight  bravely  till  the  ammunition  of  the  pocket  gives 
out,  then  they  give  way  to  die,  or  to  recruit  their 
strength  by  getting  new  ammunition  for  the  fray. 

May  31st.  Gen.  Myer  placed  at  our  command  a  Gov- 
ernment vessel,  to  take  us  around  the  Bav  of  San  Fran- 
cisco.  This  courtesy  was  due  to  a  letter  from  Gen.  Sher- 
man, introducing  and  commending  us  to  the  attention  of 
all  United  States  officers  in  command  on  the  Pacific  Coast. 


Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast.  55 

"  Prophets  are  never  without  honor  save  in  their  own 
country."  I  was  not  inclined  to  accept  the  invitation, 
but  our  friend,  Major  Caperton,  said  that  we  might  stay 
there  for  twenty  years  and  not  have  such  another  oppor- 
tunity to  see  the  bay.  We  saw  the  bay,  and  visited  its 
islands,  Alcatras  and  Angels,  and  viewed  the  Golden 
Gate.  At  Alcatras  they  gave  us  a  dress  parade,  and 
every  where  we  were  treated  with  marked  attention.  In 
this  bay  all  the  navies  of  the  world  could  ride  with  ease, 
and  so  well  is  it  fortified  that  none  could  enter  it  without 
our  permission. 

Left  in  the  evening  for  the  Yosemite  Valley,  distant 
about  three  hundred  and  fifty  miles  southeast  from  San 
Francisco,  two  hundred  and  fifty-four  miles  by  rail,  two 
hundred  and  ninety-six  miles  by  stage.  Took  stage  at 
Merced,  and  stopped  two  nights  and  one  day  at  Clark's 
Tavern  in  the  mountains,  about  seven  miles  from  the 
big  trees.  These  are  reached  by  a  trail  on  the  side  of 
the  mountain,  about  eighteen  inches  wide,  traveling  on 
mustang  ponies.  All  of  our  party  went  except  myself 
and  wife.  My  sister,  a  woman  of  sixty-five,  encountered 
the  ride,  and  came  in  as  fresh  as  a  girl  of  sixteen.  The 
air  is  so  pure  and  bracing  that  you  do  not  become 
fatigued  as  we  do  here.  Next  morning  we  took  the 
stage  for  the  Yosemite  Valley,  over  the  foot-hills  of 
the  Sierra  Nevada,  where  we  arrived  to  a  late  dinner 
Saturday  evening. 

Never  spent  so  reverential  a  Sabbath  in  my  life.     In 
the  morning  went  to  Mirror  Lake,  at  the  head  of  the 


56  Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast. 

valley,  where  we  had  a  sermon,  prayer,  and  singing  by 
Mr.  Cutter  of  our  party.  In  the  evening  and  by  moon- 
light we  went  to  see  a  small  lake  in  the  vicinity  of  the 
hotel,  where  you  see  the  falls,  the  trees,  the  flowers, 
the  moon  and  stars,  all  mirrored  in  the  placid  lake. 
Some  agreeable  young  ladies  sang  and  recited  some 
pieces  of  poetry.  They  challenged  me,  and  I  gave 
them  the  following,  by  George  D.  Prentice : 

A  NIGHT  OF  BEAUTY. 

'Tis  a  sweet  scene.     "Mid  shadows  dim 

The  mighty  river  wanders  by, 
And  on  its  calm,  unruffled  brim, 

So  soft  the  bright  star-shadows  lie, 
'T  would  seem  as  if  the  night-wind's  plume 
Had  swept  through  woods  of  tropic  bloom. 
And  shaken  down  their  blossoms  white 
To  float  upon  the  waves  to-night. 

And  see  I  as  soars  the  moon  aloft, 

Her  yellow  beams  come  through  the  air 

So  mild,  so  beautifully  soft. 

That  wave  and  wood  seemed  stirred  with  prayer : 

And  the  pure  spirit,  as  it  kneels 

At  Nature's  holy  altar,  feels 

Religion's  self  come  stealing  by 

In  every  beam  that  cleaves  the  sky. 

The  valley  is  about  ten  miles  long  and  one  mile  wide. 
The  Merced  River  flows  through  it,  about  its  middle.  It 
is  from  one  hundred  to  two  hundred  feet  wide  and  ten 
feet  deep.  It  enters  the  valley  over  two  falls,  called 
Vernal  and  Nevada,  one  seven  hundred  feet  and  the 
other  five  hundred  feet,  while  our  great  Niagara  is  only 
one  hundred  and  sixty  feet.     The  mountains  around  the 


I 


Trip  to  t1i€  Pacific  Coast.  57 

falls  vary  in  height  from  twenty-two  hundred  to  fift)'-five 
hundred  feet  above  the  level  of  the  valley.  Over  these 
mountains,  which  make  the  walls  to  the  valley,  come 
rushing  streams  of  various  sizes,  from  the  melted  snow 
on  the  still  higher  mountains  around  and  above.  You 
must  remember  that  these  tall  mountains  are  mere  foot- 
hills to  the  great  Sierra  Nevada. 

The  grandest  of  these  falls  is  called  the  Yosemite.  It 
falls  sixteen  hundred  feet,  from  the  top  of  the  mountain 
till  it  strikes  a  shoulder  in  the  rocks,  where  bv  friction 
it  has  made  a  lake  forty  feet  deep  and  covering  an  area 
of  over  ten  acres.  From  this  lake  it  falls  six  hundred 
feet  to  the  plain  below.  The  water  looks  like  soap-suds 
or  whipped  cream. 

There  are  various  others  falls  of  smaller  size,  such  as 
Ribbon,  because  the  waters  seem  to  divide  as  they 
descend  and  look  like  various  colored  ribbons ;  the  Rain- 
bow Fall,  so  called  because  a  rainbow  is  always  there, 
made  by  the  sunlight  and  the  mist  from  the  fall;  the 
Bridal-vail,  because  of  the  mist  that  envelops  the  fall 
like  a  vail. 

On  all  the  mountain  sides  are  narrow  trails  over 
which  people  go  on  mustang  ponies  and  mules  to  see 
the  various  sights  around  and  above.  None  of  our 
party  went.  Hanng  come  so  far  for  pleasure,  I  did  not 
feel  like  making  myself  miserable.  I  have  a  poor  head 
for  looking  over  a  precipice. 

June  8th.  Left  the  valley  by  another  route  than  the 
one  we  came,  called  the  Calaveras  route,  because  of  the 


6o  Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast. 

up  through  the  cold  water  of  the  lake.  One  of  them 
they  have  coffer-dammed,  and  carry  the  water  by  pipes 
to  large  bathing  houses  on  the  shore.  It  is  claimed  the 
water  cures  cutaneous  diseases. 

We  took  a  pleasant  row  in  a  skiff  about  fourteen  miles 
over  the  lake,  and  up  a  bay  about  four  miles  in  width. 
All  the  scenery  around  is  beautifully  mirrored  in  this 
placid,  glassy  water.  Here  is,  perhaps,  the  finest  echo 
in  the  world.  Every  word,  and  every  syllable  in  every 
word,  comes  back  from  the  mocking  mountains  with  per- 
fect accuracy — 

Echo  springs  up  from  her  home  in  the  rock 

And  seizes  the  perishing  strain, 
And  sends  the  gay  challenge  with  shadowy  mock 

From  mountain  to  mountain  again. 

We  crossed  the  lake  in  a  pleasant  little  steamer  on  our 
way  to  Virginia  City. 

From  Tahoe  to  Carson  City,  by  stage.  Dust  intoler- 
able.    From  Carson  to  Virginia  City  by  rail. 

Virginia  City  has  a  population  of  twelve  thousand.  It 
is  built  on  the  side  of  a  steep  mountain.  Here  are  the 
great  mines  of  the  world,  the  Bonanza,  Virginia,  Com- 
stock,  and  others,  all  within  the  limits  of  the  city.  They 
have  gone  down  to  the  depth  of  two  thousand  two  hun- 
dred feet,  and  are  still  going  down,  down,  down,  as  all 
do  who  go  after  gold — where,  I  won't  say ;  you  may.  The 
yield  per  day  is  fabulous.  The  capital  here  invested  in 
mining  is  about  one  hundred  millions  more  than  the 
value  of  the  whole  real  and  personal  estate  of  Louisville. 


Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast.  6l 

Here  you  see  more  idlers,  more  gamblers,  and  loafers, 
than  in  any  city  of  treble  its  population  on  the  Conti- 
nent. The  main  street  of  the  city  is  about  a  mile  in 
length.  About  every  third  house  is  a  gambling-house ; 
they  are  as  open  day  and  night  as  are  our  shops  on 
Fourth  Street.  At  night,  when  the  miners  come  from 
the  mines,  they  hurry  to  these  gaming-houses,  and  often 
stake  their  all  upon  the  turn  of  a  card.  It  is  considered 
unmanly  to  complain  if  they  lose,  and  impolite  to  exult  if 
they  win.  Hence  the  games  are  played  in  silence.  I 
counted  one  hundred  and  fifty  men  in  one  saloon,  all 
gambling  or  idly  watching  the  game.  The  most 
attractive  table  was  where  a  comely  woman  played  the 
game  of  "  twenty-one  up "  at  cards.  She  was  richly 
bedecked  with  jewels,  quite  witty,  and  pleasant. 

It  is  in  Virginia  City  that  Mark  Twain  gives  so  amus- 
ing an  account  of  the  burial  of  Buck  Fanshaw.  Many 
a  Fanshaw  lives  there  now.  As  this  is  a  note  from  a 
diary  of  my  thoughts,  I  thought  of  Fanshaw  and  Scotty 
and  will  here  read.  [Delivering  this  lecture,  Mr.  Speed 
here  read  the  story  of  Buck  Fanshaw  and  Scotty  Briggs 
with  a  most  pleasing  and  humorous  emphasis.] 

Leaving  Virginia  City,  and  again  reaching  the  Cen- 
tral Pacific,  we  are  homeward  bound.  It  is  time  for 
reflection.*  The  all-absorbing  subject,  when  we  were  in 
California,  was  the  Chinese  question.  All  the  newspa- 
pers, both  city  and  country,  were  filled  with  it ;  all 
seemed  to  be  opposed  to  the  Chinese.  Those  who 
thought  this  opposition  wrong,  spoke  in  subdued  tones 


62         '  Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast. 

and  with  bated  breath.  The  public  mind  was  stimulated 
to  an  alarming  degree.  Several  mobs  had  occurred, 
many  of  the  poor  people  had  been  killed,  their  houses 
burned,  and  the  inmates  driven  away.  Why,  I  would 
ask  .-'  The  universal  answer  was,  that  they  work  too 
cheap.  That  the  proud  American,  the  Irish,  and  Ger- 
man can  not  and  will  not  compete  with  such  cheap 
labor.  How,  in  a  free  country,  I  asked,  is  it  that  a  man 
can  not  sell  his  labor  to  whom  he  pleases,  and  for  what 
he  pleases  .-•  The  ready  answer  is  stereotyped,  "  This 
is  a  white  man's  country,  and  these  are  not  white  men," 
or  "This  is  a  Christian  country,  and  these  are  not  Chris- 
tians." It  reminded  me  of  the  story  of  our  Puritan 
forefathers.  When  they  met  in  council  they  had  some 
religious  misgivings  about  their  cruel  treatment  to  the 
Indians.     The  council  passed  two  resolutions : 

"  I.  Resolved,  That  the  earth  and  the  fullness  thereof 
belongs  to  the  saints. 

"  2.  Resolved,  That  we  are  the  saints." 

These  were  compromise  resolutions,  and  passed  unan- 
imously. If  there  be  any  saints  in  California,  however, 
we  did  not  see  them. 

The  Chinese  are  a  quiet,  frugal,  industrious  people. 
They  seem  to  do  all  the  work  that  is  done,  except  min- 
ing, in  California.  They  are  cooks,  waiters,  house- 
servants,  wood-choppers,  railroad  laborers,  farm-hands, 
gardeners,  washers  and  ironers.  They  are  neat  in  their 
persons  and  apparel  for  people  of  their  class.  The  men 
have  no  beard  until  they  are  fifty.     They  are  very  uni- 


Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast.  63 

form  in  their  size,  active  and  strong.  You  never  see  a 
corpulent  or  bald-headed  Chinaman.  They  are  almond 
eyed,  copper  colored,  and  wear  long  cues.  They  drink 
no  whisky,  and  follow  very  much  in  practice  the  hard 
and  frugal  precepts  of  Franklin.-^  They  can  all  read  and 
write.  They  have  their  joss  houses,  where  they  worship. 
They  have  the  gods  of  peace,  of  war,  of  medicine,  etc. 
They  teach  the  philosophy  of  Confucius,  and  practice 
pretty  well  his  precepts.  They  never  beg,  but,  like 
Christian  neighbors,  they  do  sometimes  steal.  We  send 
paid  missionaries  to  their  country  to  teach  them  to  be 
Christians.  They  come  to  our  country  without  pay  and 
ask  to  work  for  bread,  and  we  Christians  give  them 
instead  a  stone. 

The  Chinaman  is  never  naturalized  ;  he  asks  not  to 
share  in  the  great  American  privilege,  suffrage.  He  is 
content  to  abide  by  the  laws  that  others  make.  There 
have  come  to  the  Pacific  coast,  since  the  Burlingame 
treaty,  one  hundred  thousand  men,  scattered  over  the 
states  of  Oregon,  Nevada,  and  California.  Seventy 
thousand  are  now  there.  Only  one  thousand  two 
hundred  and  fifty  women  have  come;  of  these  one 
thousand  are  there  now.  Insignificant  as  is  this 
number,  our  two  great  political  parties,  jealous  of  their 
rights  —  shame,  shame  upon  them  !  —  at  their  last 
national  conventions  both  passed  resolutions  indicative 
of  their  fears  lest  this  handful  of  people  would  overrun 
our  country,  undermine  our  institutions,  and  endanger 
the  liberties  of  forty  millions   of  free  white  men   and 


64  Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast. 

women.  Ours  is  the  land  of  the  free  and  the  home  of 
the  brave,  and  every  man  and  boy  in  California  is  ready 
to  show  his  bravery  by  stoning  a  Chinaman. 

What  do  you  think  of  California  ?  asks  every  one. 
Her  history  is  wonderful.  Acquired  from  Mexico  as 
one  of  the  results  of  the  Mexican  war  in  1847,  she 
remained  in  a  territorial  condition  but  a  short  time.  In 
1849  she  held  a  convention  and  formed  a  State  constitu- 
tion. In  1850  she  was  admitted  into  the  Union.  She 
was  the  fairest  bride  ever  presented  for  union.  Her 
atmosphere  so  pure  that  you  can  see  objects  at  an  in- 
credible distance,  her  breezes  laden  with  the  perfume 
of  wild  flowers,  her  brow  begirt  with  a  tiara  of  dia- 
monds and  her  skirts  bespangled  with  gold,  her  sandaled 
feet  resting  on  the  golden  shore  of  the  great  Pacific, 
her  bridal  vail  formed  from  the  mist  of  the  sea,  and  the 
dews  of  the  mountain  extending  from  her  head  to  her 
feet — thus  she  came  in,  the  first  State  wedded  to  the 
Union  on  the  western  slope.  There  she  is,  twenty-seven 
years  old,  in  all  her  wealth  of  beauty,  with  her  great 
cities,  plains,  forests  and  golden  treasure,  improved  by 
skill  and  labor.  In  square  miles  her  territory  is  about 
equal  to  that  of  the  six  New  England  States.  She  has 
a  greater  variety  of  climate  than  any  State  in  the  Union. 
Producing  many  of  the  fruits  of  the  tropics,  and  all 
those  of  the  temperate  zone  in  great  perfection,  her  pro- 
ducts are  gold  and  silver,  wheat,  barley,  cattle,  sheep, 
fruit,  and  timber.  Her  prairies  are  large,  her  moun- 
tains high,  and  her  earthquakes  frequent  and  frightful. 


T^ip  to  the  Pacific  Coast.  65 

Her  flowers  are  wild,  luxuriant,  and  beautiful — among 
them  one  very  rare,  the  snow-plant.  It  grows  in  great 
abundance  on  the  mountains  around  Lake  Tahoe.  The 
lake,  as  I  have  said,  is  sixty-two  hundred  feet  above  the 
level  of  the  sea.  These  flowers  you  find  from  four  hun- 
dred to  five  hundred  feet  above  the  level  of  the  lake  at 
the  foot  of  and  in  the  ridge  of  the  snow-banks.  The 
plant  is  bulbous,  with  a  stem  as  large  as  one's  arm,  vary- 
ing in  height  from  nine  to  eighteen  inches.  It  is  deep 
red,  shaped  like  an  asparagus  stalk.  Its  leaves  hug  close 
to  the  stem  in  folds,  like  the  onion.  The  inside  of  the 
leaf  is  most  beautiful.  The  main  stem,  or  spine  of  the 
leaf,  with  the  ribs  which  shoot  out  from  it  are  pale 
red,  varying  in  color  but  resembling  the  most  delicate 
tints  of  the  Florida  shells  or  of  the  rainbow.  Its  flower 
is  red  and  very  beautiful.  I  will  not  attempt  to  de- 
scribe it. 

The  people  of  California  are  nearly  all  adventurers. 
The}--  measure  every  thing  by  the  gold  standard,  men  as 
well  as  mules.  You  never  hear  of  Mr.  Smith  as  a  good 
man,  or  Mr.  Brown  as  an  honest  man,  or  Mr.  Jones  as  a 
Christian.  But  Mr.  S.  has  twenty  thousand  million, 
Mr.  B.  has  ten  million,  and  Mr.  J.  five  million,  and  so 
on.  The  more  he  has,  the  better  he  is — and  it  mat- 
ters not  how  he  got  it,  so  he  has  it.     In  California 

"  Money  makes  the  man,  the  want  of  it  the  fellow, 
The  rest  is  all  either  leather  or  prunella." 

I  could  but  think  of  this  as  I  saw  the  burial  vault  of 
W.    C.  Ralston.     He  was  better  known   for  his  great 

5 


66  Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast. 

money  dealings,  for  keeping  one  hundred  horses  and 
thirty  vehicles  for  his  own  use,  his  wild  extravagance, 
his  enterprise,  and  his  charities,  than  any  man  who  has 
lived  in  America.  He  was  as  well  known  in  California 
as  was  Clay  in  Kentucky,  or  Jackson  in  Tennessee, 
receiving  for  his  personal  service  ^60,000  per  year  from 
the  bank  of  California,  and  ^40,000  from  other  corpora- 
tions.   Yet  he  went  down  in  the  storm.     On  the  door  of 

his  small  vault  is, 

"  Wm.  C.  Ralston  : 
Born  in  New  York ;  died  in  San  Francisco,  aged  fifty-two  years. 

Adieu." 

He  bid  the  world  adieu,  and  ended  his  life  in  a  watery 
grave — 

'Tis  the  wink  of  an  eye,  't  is  the  draught  of  a  breath, 
From  the  blossom  of  health  to  the  paleness  of  death. 
From  the  gilded  saloon  to  the  bier  and  the  shroud — 
Oh,  why  should  the  spirit  of  mortal  be  proud ! 

I  thought  of  the  fable  of  the  oak  and  the  violet.  The 
tall  oak,  the  king  of  the  forest,  catching  the  first  beams 
of  the  morning  sun,  proud  of  its  height  and  glory, 
looked  down  upon  the  humble  violet  at  its  feet,  and  thus 
spoke,  "  Poor  little  violet,  how  sweet  you  are !  If  you 
were  only  up  here  where  men  could  see  and  admire  you, 
how  happy  and  proud  you  would  be."  The  modest 
little  violet  blushed,  and  for  a  time  was  unhappy  at  her 
humble  lot.  At  night  the  storm  came  and  the  great 
proud  oak  went  down  with  a  crash,  its  great  branches 
prostrate  on  the  earth  and  its  roots  in  the  air,  never  to 
rise  again.     The  modest  little  violet  peeped  out  unhurt, 


Trip  to  the  Pacific  Coast.  .    6^ 

fragrant  as  ever,  and  was  ever  after  content  with  her  lot. 
The  great  financial  storm  that  has  taken  up  by  the 
roots  so  many  tall  oaks,  has  left  many  a  violet  fragrant 
with  honest  toil,  contentment,  and  Christian  charity. 

I  do  not  underrate  the  people  of  California.  They 
have  accomplished  much.  San  Francisco,  the  New 
York  of  the  Pacific  coast,  has  a  population  of  three 
hundred  thousand  ;  about  double  the  size  of  our  city, 
the  growth  of  the  last  twenty-nine  years.  Its  buildings 
are  grand,  its  shipping  immense — all  seem  to  be  proud 
of  it.  The  instincts  of  the  people  are  quick,  and  they 
are  much  given  to  gambling.  Their  fortunes,  unless 
well  established,  are  fleeting  as  the  clouds.  One  young 
man,  a  Kentuckian,  told  me  that  he  had  made  ^200,000 
last  year.  "  In  what  business .?"  I  asked.  "  In  the  put 
and  call  business,"  he  replied.  I  read  of  his  failure  not 
long  ago. 

From  May  to  November  it  never  rains.  From 
November  to  May  it  is  seldom  dry.  The  crops  are 
more  uncertain  than  with  us.  I  would  not  advise  a 
poor  man  to  go  there.  Every  thing  is  done  on  a  large 
scale.  Individual  effort  can  do  but  little  against  com- 
bined capital. 

Give  me  for  my  home  old  Kentucky,  where  we  have 
a  better  distribution  of  property ;  where  an  easy  con- 
science gives  contentment,  without  great  wealth ;  where 
an  independent  peasantry  is  the  strength  of  the  State — 

Breathes  there  a  man  with  soul  so  dead, 
Who  never  to  himself  has  said 
This  is  my  own,  my  native  land  ? 


/ 


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